Between the Shadow and the Soul
by apinknightmare
Summary: A story about the "I love you," and everything that comes after. Will update daily until it's complete.
1. Chapter 1

I originally posted the first chapter of this as part of a one-shot collection of mine named Dust to Dust. I decided I wanted to expand on that one-shot and write a series based on it, so I'm moving it here.

This group of "one-shots" are all part of the same story/journey and timeline and will be posted in chronological order, but they can be read as stand-alones.

The title comes from Sonnet XVII by Pablo Neruda.

Special thanks to rummyjoe for the beta work!

As I wrote in the summary, I'll update this every day until it's complete. Okay, here goes!

* * *

Oliver finally locates Felicity when he parts a sea of A.R.G.U.S. agents, shoving through the crowd of them gathered on the street outside the treatment plant. Slade's long gone, ushered away in handcuffs by Waller and two large men. Now they just have to tend to the business of the aftermath: rebuilding the city and chasing away the demons this night unleashed within all of them.

His heart skips when he sees her, looking shaken but trying like hell to hide it. She's hugging her arms to her body, shivering, and Oliver can't contain the rage that bubbles up inside him. He yells at anyone who will listen, doesn't _someone_ have a blanket? Seconds later, a small woman in a paramedic's uniform is placing one in his hands. He shakes it open and wraps it around her shoulders, gathers the edges in his grip and pulls her close, right against his chest. He winds his arms around her and holds on tight, like somehow he'll be able to cocoon her inside his body, carry her around with him to keep her safe.

He risked too much tonight, put her life and her heart on the line. And now that they're both standing on the other side of the fight, safe from one madman even though others are waiting for them just over the horizon, Oliver's not sure if the risk was worth it. Felicity has withdrawn into herself, and he knows how she feels. He's all too familiar with the emotional crash that comes when you finally start to realize all the fears the adrenaline chased away. He never wanted her to become familiar with it too, but she's too far in now, he won't ask her to leave. In fact, he holds her tighter. She'll keep pushing him along the path to becoming a hero and he'll always come up just short, because he doesn't think he'll ever stop being selfish when it comes to her.

He told her he loved her. It was a stupid, reckless thing, but he couldn't help himself when he was faced with the grim reality of what he was asking her to do. He wonders if she knows he wasn't lying, but does it really matter? Those words have consequences whether she knows he meant them or not, and Oliver wonders what his will be. What will he do if their relationship changes? What will he do if it doesn't?

"Are you okay?" Oliver whispers. He waits for an answer, gets a feeble nod against his chest in return. He needs to see her face, so he crooks his fingers beneath her chin and tilts her head up. Her eyes are watery, but she won't cry, and he traces the pad of his thumb along the delicate curve of her lower lip.

He wants to kiss her; warm and slow, until his mouth chases the chill from her body and the doubt from her heart. It would be such a comforting thing, but she pulls away and turns her head, quietly tells him that she wants to go home.

He nods, tosses the blanket aside, and leads her to the alleyway where he stashed his bike. She settles onto the seat behind him and he reaches back, sliding his hands over hers and guiding them into his jacket pockets. He didn't bring a helmet so he tells her to hold on tight, press her cheek against his back and close her eyes.

The rumbling engine shatters the early morning silence, and they ride off into the night.

* * *

Felicity's in the shower for a long time, stretching the limits of her hot water heater.

Oliver sits, hunched over her tiny kitchen table, staring at the delicate flowered pattern on her tablecloth. He balances a small plate on his knee, on top of which is his attempt at dinner. On the island, he learned how to cook a rabbit to perfection. With an open flame, he could turn a fresh kill into the perfect meal. Here—in a modern kitchen—he's lost. But he knows how to use a knife, so ham and cheese it is. He just hopes that she'll eat it.

Eventually Felicity pads into the kitchen with her wet hair piled on top of her head, her small frame drowning in a fluffy pink bathrobe. He pushes the plate toward her. She looks at the sandwich, picks at the crust. The shower washed away a lot of the blood from her head wound, and only now can he see how large the gash truly is. Someone should've given her stitches. He should take her to the hospital now, but she'd fight him and that's the last thing he wants. He reaches over and skims his finger along the edge of the bruise that's blooming just below Felicity's hairline, and tries to ignore the ache in his chest when she flinches at his touch.

Not used to silence when he's around her, Oliver stares down at his lap, picking at a hangnail as he works up the courage to ask the question he's afraid of hearing the answer to. It gets caught in his throat every time he attempts to ask it, until the words finally just spill out.

"Did he hurt you?"

She looks up from her sandwich and there's no warmth in her eyes; Oliver feels like he's looking at a stranger. It's disconcerting, but he buries the feeling. This isn't about him.

"No," she says quietly, then shakes her head. "Not in the way that you think."

Oliver stops breathing and squares his shoulders, ready to fight an invisible enemy. "What did-"

Felicity's chair scrapes loudly against the floor, and Oliver watches her disappear up the stairs. He waits an hour for her to come back down.

She doesn't.

* * *

The buttery yellow slice of light shining through the crack beneath Felicity's bedroom door leads Oliver down the hallway like some kind of beacon. He raises his hand to knock, but thinks better of it. She won't talk to him until she's ready, and he'll wait. Maybe it's time he was the one waiting on her for a change.

Exhausted from the events of the night, Oliver leans against the wall, rests his weight there until his legs can't hold him up anymore and he slides down onto the floor. His head lolls back against the doorframe and he closes his eyes. Not for the first time, he wonders what his life would've been like if he hadn't gotten on the Gambit. He wonders what would've happened after his relationship with Laurel ended, once she found out about Sara. About all the others.

How long would it have taken him to grow up and get his shit together? Would he have started working at QC like his father wanted him to? He imagines running into Felicity at Big Belly during the lunch rush, asking if he could sit with her because there weren't any other open tables. He'd hold out his QC badge so she'd know he wasn't trying to put the moves on her, and she'd do the same. They'd talk about work. She'd tease him about how quickly he ate, and he'd laugh at the way she flipped her burger over and reassembled it from the bottom up before she would eat it. She always does that. He thinks it's cute in this life, he would've thought it was cute in that one.

He would've loved her in that life, too. He wonders if she could have loved him.

* * *

Their plane to China is ready to board, and Oliver stands, slinging his duffel over his shoulder. He picks up Felicity's bag with his free hand, then looks down at her. She's still in her seat, all hunched over her tablet.

"What are you doing?" Oliver asks. She still isn't talking much, but she's coming around.

She looks up at him, her eyes brighter than they have been in hours. There are bags under them though, she needs to sleep. On the plane he'll insist.

"I'm researching," she says.

"Researching what?" He steels himself, a little worried about the answer.

She presses the button that puts her tablet to sleep and stands. "Making transistor radios out of coconuts. You know, just in case we go Gilligan. I really hate that island, I'd never make it five years."

Oliver laughs, and the sound is so foreign that it surprises him, but it manages to draw a smile from Felicity. It's been at least day since he's seen one from her, much too long. He sighs, can't take his eyes off her.

_God,_ he thinks. _She's beautiful._


	2. Chapter 2

Felicity finds him just before sunset.

"Oliver?"

It's the first thing he's heard in hours, her voice is the sweetest sound. Her hand on his shoulder is like a life preserver; he clutches it between his fingers, uses her warmth to pull himself back from the brink.

His eyes meet hers when he turns his head. He's been staring at his mother's name—so carefully engraved in the flawless granite headstone—for so long that he can still see it every time he blinks. _Moira Queen_ is everywhere.

Felicity kneels next to him and holds an umbrella over their heads, her knees sinking into the wet earth. Oliver pats at his chest, realizing that his shirt is soaked through, and he looks up at her, confused. He tries to ask her when it started raining, but his mouth won't move. His teeth are chattering.

"How long have you been out here?" Felicity asks, but it's quiet, like she doesn't expect an answer. Good thing, because he can't give her one. She slides her arm around his back and somehow manages to pull him upright. He leans on her, lets her lead the way to her car.

Oliver kind of stumbles into the seat and slumps against the dashboard as Felicity rushes to the driver's side. He cringes when she slams the door, watches her fingers fumble with the key as she turns it in the ignition. Once the engine's humming, she cranks the heat full-blast, pointing all the vents in his direction.

"I wish I had a blanket," she says. "Digg told me I should keep a blanket in the trunk."

Oliver looks down, notices that his boots are caked with mud. Felicity's black floor mat is covered in it.

"Hey," Felicity whispers. "Hold your hands up to the vents. Get warm."

She's wearing his favorite dress of hers, and there's dirt streaked all along the skirt from where she kneeled in the grass. He reaches out and slides the hem between his fingers, looks back at the stain from where he nearly bled out in the back seat. He leaves a mark everywhere he goes, destroys everything he touches.

He wonders how long it'll be until he destroys her.

"Oliver," Felicity says, prying his curled-up fingers from his palm before she holds his hand right in front of the vent. "Please."

He does as she asks, and she observes him for a minute before she decides it's okay to leave.

The ride is quiet. Oliver doesn't know where they're going, and he doesn't much care. It's not like he has a place to live right now. He's been sleeping on a cot in the corner of their new lair, carving out a meager existence in that basement. Living? He hasn't done anything like that in a really long time.

He's relieved when Felicity pulls to a stop in front of her townhouse. If he could pick anywhere in the world to be right now, it'd be here. He manages to get out of the car on his own, follows her up the porch steps to her front door. She makes him kick off his shoes before she lets him inside.

Like an obedient puppy, Oliver sits in the chaise next to her living room window, memorizing the pattern of the throw rug in the middle of the room until she brings him a steaming hot cup of tea and a sandwich to distract him. She asks him to _eat, please_ before she walks away. He does.

Felicity returns a few minutes later, pulls the empty cup and plate from Oliver's grip. She takes his hand, leads him upstairs to the second door on the right. Steam swirls out into the hallway, and the promise of a warm shower invites him inside. He closes the door behind him.

Oliver strips off his clothes and steps under the spray, closes his eyes and lets the water wash over him. He can't get enough; it reminds him of the first shower he had when he came home from Lian Yu, when the steam cleared his head and loosened his tight muscles. The water's running cold when he finally turns off the faucet, and he feels more like himself once he's dry.

Felicity left a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt for Oliver to change into on the vanity. They fit him perfectly, and he tries not to wonder who they used to belong to.

He finds her across the hall in her guest bedroom. She's turning down the sheets, fluffing up the pillows.

"You're staying here tonight," she says.

"Okay."

Even if he had the will to argue, he wouldn't. He wants to be here. No, that's not entirely true. He wants to be here _with her_.

Felicity looks surprised, like she expected an argument. She's changed into her pajamas, a pink shirt and pink pants with tiny white flowers all over them. Her hair's up in a messy bun, and the whole effect is just…really nice. Felicity is the kind of person that exudes happiness, and although Oliver would never admit this, sometimes he aches when he's around her. She makes him want things—makes him hope for things—that he's not sure he can ever have.

"Get in," she says softly, tilting her head toward the bed. "I'll be right back."

He climbs in, pulls the covers over himself, hears her start a load of laundry—probably his wet clothes—then listens as her footsteps echo down the creaky stairs. She returns a few minutes later with a bottle of ibuprofen and a tall glass of water, setting both on the nightstand next to him. He wonders how she knows his head is throbbing.

"I'm right next door if you need anything."

She reaches under the lampshade to turn off the light and he catches her wrist, pulls her down until she's sitting next to him. He brings her hand up to his cheek and rests it there, doesn't even give himself time to second-guess what he's doing. It's been so long since anyone touched him like this, and he just wants to feel someone else's skin on his. He knows she won't initiate it—the fake-but-real _I love you_ still hangs awkwardly in the air between them—so he does it for her. The effect is almost immediate, soothing him in a way that no pill ever could.

Oliver takes a deep breath, swallows. "I'm such a hypocrite. I lectured her about secrets, Felicity. Acted superior when-"

"Oliver," she says. "Don't do this, nothing good will come of it." Her fingers slide through his hair in a calming, repetitive circuit, fingernails gently scraping across his scalp, chasing away the tears that burn behind his eyelids.

"She knew."

Her surprise only registers in the way her hand stills. She doesn't say a word.

"She told me the night she died. She said she was proud of me." The tears come then, he can't stop them. Felicity does though, with the swipe of her thumb across his cheeks.

"There's a lot to be proud of," she whispers. "Even if you can't see it."

He purses his lips and swallows. Nods against her palm.

"This probably isn't the right time," Felicity says, her voice cracking. Her eyes are shining and Oliver can't look away from her; she has his undivided attention. "I've been wanting to tell you for a while now, just…how sorry I am, Oliver. I am so, so sorry."

Oliver's brows draw together. "For what?"

Felicity takes a deep breath, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth before she finally speaks. "You were angry at your mother for the last few months of her life. I know how precious time is when you don't have very much of it." She pauses. Oliver knows she's trying to get the words right. "I'm sorry that things worked out the way that they did."

This time, his thumbs chase away her tears. "Don't apologize for telling me, Felicity."

She smiles sadly as she shakes her head. "I'm not. I don't regret that. I would never keep a secret from you. I just wish that the past few months could've been better for you and Thea. And for Moira, too."

"I should've told them about Slade," he says, feeling a familiar panic rise up and claw at his insides. "I should've told Thea…If I had just…"

"Oliver."

There's that gentle scratch from her fingertips again, quelling the tide of sorrow, bringing him back to her when he starts to drift away.

"Listen to me. There are so many people who love you." Her voice is so soft and full of conviction that he believes her. "They are stronger and more understanding than you think. You keep so much in here," she says, gently tapping against his forehead before her hand comes to rest right over his heart. "And this is always so heavy. Secrets, Oliver…they're inevitable with what we do, but there are secrets that you keep to protect other people, and there are secrets that you keep to protect yourself; to hide the ugly things you think no one else can stand to see. I think you should start figuring out why you're holding onto so much, and see if you might be able to start letting some of it go."

Every thread of regret in Oliver's body ties itself into a knot in his throat. He can barely swallow, barely breathe. He can't stand the weight of the honesty in Felicity's eyes, but he can't look away, either. What he says surprises him.

"I'm so ashamed. If you knew what I've done…"

"I _do_ know what you've done," she says, cupping his cheek and offering him a smile. She's so bright it almost hurts. "I know how many lives you've saved, how many retirement accounts you've restored. I know how many children in this city still have parents because of you. So, whatever you did on that island and before it, Oliver, what you've done after? It tips the scales in your favor."

Oliver draws a shaky breath and blinks away his tears. He longs to wrap his hands around hers. He nearly does it, but by the time he makes the decision to act, the moment has passed.

"There is, of course, the minor issue of property damage," she says lightly. "But the taxpayers of Starling City don't seem to be holding that against you yet."

"Not yet." The corners of his mouth turn up into the closest approximation of a smile he can manage.

"Promise me something?"

He wants to promise her anything, but he knows he can't. She takes his silence as an invitation to ask anyway.

"When Thea comes back? Tell her everything. Tell her the things you think she might already know and the things you know she doesn't. All of it, Oliver, okay? Don't keep any more secrets from her. Don't let that island steal another person from you. _Please_."

"I promise." His voice is raspy, he can barely get the words out.

"Good."

Felicity stands, and he wishes he could ask her to stay. He wants to bury his face in her hair and hold on tight, tangle their legs together under the sheets. He wants more than that too, but he won't ask for it until he has something more to offer her. It scares him to think that day might never come.

She touches his cheek one more time, gentle as the breeze. "If you don't wake me up in the middle of the night doing pushups or some other kind of sleep-avoidance exercise, I'll make you some pancakes in the morning, deal?"

Oliver grins. For the first time since they left the cemetery, he feels like he can breathe. "With chocolate chips?"

"Do you really need to ask?"

He laughs like his whole world hasn't fallen apart, and for a second he forgets that it has. Felicity, she always makes him forget. "Deal," he says.

"Goodnight," she whispers.

"Goodnight."

Felicity leaves the door cracked just enough so that the soft light from the bathroom filters in, because she knows these days he doesn't care for the dark. Oliver turns onto his side, pulls the covers up over his shoulders and breathes deep. He tries like hell not to think about how this feels more like home than any other place has in a long, long time.

Fitfully, he sleeps.


	3. Chapter 3

Oliver lands a crippling blow to the wing chun dummy that sends one of its arms flying, wood splintering and skittering across the concrete floor. He kicks it for good measure when he catches the sight of Felicity's empty chair out of the corner of his eye. He's all annoyed, angry energy tonight, desperate for an outlet. He should suit up, jump from rooftop to rooftop until he finds a criminal or two to let loose on.

"You might want to be careful," Diggle says, glancing at the carnage. "Those aren't as easy to replace as they used to be."

Oliver clenches his teeth, feels a dull, tense ache in his jaw. Diggle is one of two people in this world who can cut him to the quick with their absolute, unwavering honesty. That honesty usually keeps Oliver grounded, but he doesn't want to think about honor or duty or the fact that he is undeniably cash poor. Tonight he just wants to beat the everliving hell out of something until it's as broken and unrecognizable as he feels.

Much as Oliver doesn't want to admit it, Diggle does have a point: abusing his training equipment when he doesn't have the means to replace it? Probably not the best idea.

"You looking for a fair fight?" Digg cracks his knuckles, steps onto the mat.

"You don't want to fight me right now, Diggle." Oliver's going for a low, menacing tone, but he only manages to sound a little lost, and he hates that. He pulls himself up onto the salmon ladder's bottom rung and propels himself upward, enjoying the metal clang of the bar as he racks up notch after notch, replacing the ache in his heart with one in his muscles.

"Not that it's any of your business," Digg says, standing at the bottom of the ladder, arms crossed. "But she's out with some friends tonight, some girls she knew in college."

Digg's right, it isn't any of Oliver's business, but he likes knowing just the same. Hearing Felicity isn't on a date makes the anger drain out of him, and Oliver realizes that makes him a selfish asshole because he can't give her what she needs, but he doesn't want anyone else to, either. That's the paradox where Felicity is concerned: Oliver knows she'd be better off if she wasn't so close to him, but he can't stand it when she's too far away.

Oliver lets go of the bar, lands heavily on his feet. Digg tosses him a towel and he scrubs his face with it, then slings it across the back of his neck.

"You ever planning on telling her it wasn't a lie?"

Oliver sighs, rubs his hand across his mouth. "Not anytime soon."

"She's gonna start dating, you know. Now that every moment of her day isn't tied to you, she's gonna have more opportunities, Oliver, and she might take them. You need to find a way of dealing with that. Preferably one that doesn't involve destroying yourself or your property."

"I know," Oliver replies quietly. "But it's better this way."

Diggle huffs and rolls his eyes. "Better for who? You still think you don't deserve to be happy?"

Oliver swallows, deliberates how he's going to say exactly what's on his mind, what's holding him back. "I think…I think that _she_ deserves to be happy, and I don't know how to be what she needs."

"You start by being her friend, Oliver."

"I _am_ her friend."

Digg smiles and shakes his head. "You two are close when it relates to Arrow business, and you're friendly with her, but I don't know if I'd call you two _friends_, exactly. Go to a movie, or show up at her house with a pizza one night. Sit and talk to her, get to know her outside of all this. By the time you're ready to be what she needs, you'll know exactly how to do that."

Oliver stares at the floor and absorbs what Diggle is telling him. He knows what kind of tech Felicity likes, and he knows her favorite order from the sushi place down the street, but when it comes down to it, Oliver really doesn't know her at all. He'd like to, though. He thinks getting to know her might fill up one of those hollow places inside of him.

"You have this mission now, this drive, but what's going to happen when you can't suit up anymore?" Digg uncaps a bottle of water and takes a drink. "That knee isn't going to get any better, Oliver. Once your body starts giving out on you, that's it. The way things are now? You're gonna be left with nothing in the end. In ten years you're gonna regret how much you missed."

_Ten years_, Oliver thinks.

There was a time not too long ago when ten years seemed like an impossibility, when a life after the Arrow was unfathomable. Oliver never allowed himself to think of the 'after,' because he always assumed there wouldn't be one.

Now, he thinks about it.

Every day he wants it more.


	4. Chapter 4

It's the wine.

Oliver's rethinking the wine. See, wine makes this seem like a date, and it's definitely _not_ a date. How can it be a date? Felicity doesn't even know he's here.

Which reminds him, he should probably knock. Yeah, knocking would be a good idea. Unless…unless he just walks down the street and puts the bottle on someone's doorstep, because he's _really_ not sure about it. No, she likes wine, he's bringing her wine. He's not going to look into it any further than that, and he hopes—for his sake—that she doesn't either.

Oliver balances the pizza box against his hip, sets the bottle on top of it, then knocks on Felicity's front door. Should he have called? Yeah, probably. It's not like he didn't think of it, he does possess _some_ manners. The thing is, he didn't want to tell her he was on his way over because he was worried that she'd tell him not to come. He was also worried that she'd want him to. Basically, he was worried about a lot of things.

Now Oliver's just nervous and awkward, but what's there to be nervous and awkward about? He's her friend. Well, he's _trying_ to be her friend. He wants to be so much more, and it all hinges on this.

Jesus, his palms are sweating.

The porch light flickers on without warning, and Oliver squints against the sudden onslaught of brightness. He hears a pause in her footsteps, long enough for her to look through the peep hole. Another pause, long enough for her to debate about whether she should let him in. His heart is just kind of bouncing around inside of him; he can feel it beating in his throat.

_Please,_ he thinks. _Please open the door._

When Felicity does open the door, Oliver notices that she's a little out of breath. Her hair is down, and he fixates on this one wisp of a curl that's bending over the collar of her frilly pink blouse.

"Oliver?" she asks.

He gives her what he thinks is a smile, but considering the confused look on her face, it's probably not.

"Hi?" he says. "I thought you might be hungry? I thought you might like some pizza?" Why does everything he says sound like a question? Why is he thrusting the bottle of wine at her? The fact that he has a reputation for being a playboy nearly makes him laugh. There is nothing playboy-ish about him in this moment. In fact, he's pretty sure Felicity thinks he's hit his head.

"Are you okay?" She reaches out to touch him—she's going for his face, he thinks—but she second-guesses that move and her arm is just…right there between them for a few moments before it eventually drops to her side.

"Oh! Yeah," he says. "I thought…" He looks down at the box he's holding, like that's the answer to her question.

She gives him this shy, perfect smile, like for once she's glad that she's not the one babbling. He'll babble for the rest of his life if it makes her look like this.

"Would you like to come in?" she asks.

He would like that very much. He steps inside and she takes the wine and pizza from him so he can shrug out of his coat. The house smells like her, and it calms him. It's just dinner between friends. Dinner and drinks and small talk.

"We can eat in here or by the door, if you want, since you seem to like it over there," she says. Somehow she's in the living room now and he's…not.

Oliver laughs, and the tension melts right out of him as he walks over to her. He realizes that even though he spent so much time convincing himself that this isn't a date, he desperately wishes it was. Maybe one day it will be, if he can manage not to fuck it all up.

* * *

They sit across from each other on the floor, legs crossed under Felicity's coffee table. They don't even bother with plates, just hold the pizza over flowery paper towels Felicity brought in from the kitchen. When he's finished, Oliver stretches his arms out and leans back against her sofa, watching her nibble on the last slice as he nurses his glass of wine.

"You don't like green peppers?" he asks, eying the Felicity-made pile of them in the corner of the box.

She wrinkles her nose and shakes her head. Oliver thinks it might be the cutest thing he's ever seen.

He laughs. "Okay, now I know."

"For next time." Felicity sighs, then purses her lips. "Not that there's going to be a next time, I mean-"

"Felicity." A soft, simple brush of his knee against her thigh is enough to bring her back to him. He grins when their eyes meet; her cheeks are flushed pink. "There's going to be a next time."

"Oh." She puts down her crust and smiles at the floor.

Oliver feels something warm unfurling in his chest, stretching out into his fingertips. He wants to touch her, to run his fingers through the hair at the nape of her neck and tilt her head back so he can taste her perfect, pale skin. He needs to do pretty much anything _but_ that, so he wraps his fingers around the stem of his glass and holds on tight.

* * *

"Do you want a big cup or a small one?" Felicity calls out from the kitchen.

"Small," Oliver replies, standing in the middle of her living room. "Water, please."

"You had one glass of wine and I had, well…that's not important."

The corner of his mouth lifts. "I don't like to drink much anymore. Just in case."

She nods as she walks in and hands him the cup. "Yeah, that makes sense."

He looks around her living room, taking it all in. It's not like he's never been in here before; he just hasn't ever let himself be _present_ when he was in her home. He always arrived and departed as quickly as possible, never giving himself enough time to get comfortable. Now, he understands why; if he gets comfortable here, he'll want to stay, and he's not supposed to want that. Not yet.

Oliver's eyes are drawn to the built-ins that surround her fireplace. There are books stacked upon books, DVDs, pictures everywhere.

"May I?" he asks, nodding at the bookcases. He feels like those shelves hold some of the pieces to the puzzle that is Felicity, and he wants to get a better look, wants to see how everything fits together.

Felicity nods.

His eyes are drawn to a grouping of frames filled with pictures of bright flowers. Close-up, the detail is astounding. The photos remind him of Felicity's fingernails in the springtime: vivid pops of color. He knows she took them, he doesn't need to ask. They _look_ like her, and something about them makes him feel lighter.

"You're very talented," he says, smiling at her over his shoulder.

"Thank you."

Really, there are pictures everywhere. He wishes he had looked at them before tonight. There's Felicity as a child at band practice, cheeks puffed out as she blows into a tuba ("I played for, like, ten days maybe. I had to stop because I hated all the blowing. I mean, I like blowing, I can blow…it just hurt my mouth. Not that…you know what? Never mind."), and there are countless others of her with her friends.

Felicity has a _lot_ of friends. That surprises Oliver, and yet it doesn't. How could someone like Felicity not have friends? How come he's never heard about any of them? He thinks on that, wonders if maybe she told him about them when he wasn't listening. Maybe she never told him about them because he never bothered to ask.

Tonight, he asks.

She answers him with anecdotes that make him laugh, and some that break his heart. All of them make him fall a little more in love with her.

It doesn't escape his attention that not a single one of her stories involves her mother. He knows they don't have a great relationship, but never gave much thought to how bad it could be.

When he finds a picture of Felicity at her graduation from MIT, he takes his chance. "Your mother's not in any of these," he says quietly. Not that he knows what Felicity's mother looks like, but he knows he'd recognize her if he saw her.

"That's because I don't have any with her in them," she says matter-of-factly. "She didn't come to my graduation."

"What?" Oliver's sure he didn't hear that correctly.

"She was personally offended that I wanted out of Vegas. She never could understand why I was so driven to leave. I grew up in a trailer, and we…we never had enough. I didn't want that for myself, you know?"

Felicity is looking at him with her big blue eyes, just begging him to understand, like admitting that she wanted—wants—more makes her a bad person. He knows exactly how that feels.

"She was practically giddy when she found out I was working as your assistant." Felicity laughs a little when she says it, like it's not a big deal. There isn't a single drop of malice in her words, but shame washes over him. It's a feeling he's familiar with, but he especially hates it when it's associated with her.

Oliver's reminded of all the times since he met Felicity that he put his needs above hers, under the guise of working for the common good of the city. He promises himself that he won't ever do that again.

"You know," she whispers, "I might not have always agreed with her methods, and she wasn't always very nice to me, but your mother, Oliver, she loved you and Thea _so_ much. So much that she…"

_Died for us_, he thinks. His mother loved him and his sister so much that she _died_ for them, and Felicity's wouldn't even step on a plane to go to her graduation. He understands now how difficult it must've been for her to reveal his mother's secret. She'd told him as much at the rally, and then he left her. He left her and ran straight to Sara.

He feels sick.

Oliver reaches out for Felicity's hand; their fingertips barely touch before she pulls away. He's hyperaware of how not ready for her he is, so he's grateful when the moment passes and they can get back to the business of pretending this thing between them doesn't exist.

He takes a step to the side, towards Felicity's book collection. Looking at more pictures will lead to more questions, and he isn't sure if the two of them can handle that tonight. He's already toeing such a delicate line; he doesn't want to overstep. He has to be so careful with her heart.

Needing a distraction, Oliver scans her paperback spines, reads the titles. He's truly surprised by what he sees. He thought she'd have computer science manuals and tech magazines, and maybe she does somewhere. But here there's—"Romance novels?"

Felicity groans, hides her face with her hands. "It's nice to have some mindless reading sometimes when I can't sleep. I like them and all, but I think the people who write them enjoy using all the words that I hate, like 'moist' and 'quivering' and 'ministrations.' Ministrations has to be the least sexy word ever, and…oh my god I can't believe I'm telling you this."

Oliver laughs, he can't help himself.

She looks up at him, red-faced. "They're a guilty pleasure, okay?"

"Pleasure?"

Felicity grabs a pillow and hits him with it, but she's smiling. Everything is right again.

"I can't really judge," Oliver admits. "I used to like reading Thea's old Nancy Drew books when I couldn't sleep after I came back from the island."

"Used to?"

Oliver shrugs, trying to loosen the hurt that threads its way through his chest. "They're packed away somewhere. I'm not sure where they are."

"We'll find them," she says.

Oliver gets the feeling that Felicity can help him find a lot of things he thought he'd lost.

* * *

A week later, after Digg, Roy, and Felicity have gone home, Oliver finds a stack of books on the crate next to his cot in the lair, and he can't stop smiling.

That night, he falls asleep with Nancy Drew #109 propped on his chest.

He dreams of Felicity.


	5. Chapter 5

Oliver maneuvers Felicity's Mini into a tight spot at the end of the street, just around the corner from her favorite coffee shop. It's a beautiful afternoon and the sidewalks are crowded; it seems like half of Starling City is out and about, walking around in their shorts and t-shirts, enjoying the rare warm late-winter weather.

Oliver owes Felicity a coffee for letting him borrow her car, and maybe when he drops it off to her at home, he'll convince her to go for a walk. After a long day of even longer meetings with his lawyers, both his mind and his body could use a break. He loosens his tie as he steps up to the counter and starts to place his order, but the girl is familiar enough with him now that she already knows what he wants. He offers her a smile and his thanks, and while he waits he pulls out his phone and sees that he has a couple of missed texts from Felicity.

_At the office getting some work done. -F_

_And by "office" I mean I'm at The Grind. -F_

_And I'm telling you this because I want you to meet me there when you get out. Hope it's going well. :) -F_

A rush of nervous excitement pushes through Oliver's veins, landing with a heavy plunk right in the pit of his stomach. He looks around, searching the crowd for Felicity. He thinks he might've missed her until he spots her sunny blonde hair peeking out from behind the silhouette of a tall, unfamiliar man.

Well, he's unfamiliar to Oliver. He doesn't seem to be so unfamiliar to Felicity. She's laughing at something he said, smiling at him. It's the kind of smile that Oliver's usually on the receiving end of, and he never expected it would hurt so badly to see it directed at somebody else. It's like a punch to the gut; he can actually feel his muscles tighten as the breath leaves his body.

Oliver stands there, dumbfounded.

"Mister Queen?" The barista—Wendy—is holding two cups toward him. He just stares at the way their names are scrawled out across the cup sleeves. _Oliver. Felicity. Oliver, Felicity_. They look nice together like that, he thinks. "Your order, sir?"

Right, right. His order. Coffee for him. And Felicity. Who's over there talking to some other guy. Which, Oliver has to remind himself, she has every right to do, because he's just her friend. He's not ready to be more than that yet, but there are other men who will be ready. Other men who are ready, and she's talking to one of them right now.

Oliver takes their cups, starts to walk over to Felicity's table. Should he interrupt? He's about to start a never-ending debate with himself over interrupting-some-guy-as-he's-probably-asking-the-woman-you-love-out-on-a-date etiquette when Felicity spots him and waves him over. She looks happy to see him, the guy she's talking to does not. Childish as it is, that gives Oliver some satisfaction.

The guy's gone by the time Oliver reaches Felicity's corner of the cafe. When he walks up, she stands and pushes her computer and mess of paperwork to the other side of the table.

"You'll be more comfortable there," she says, grinning as she sits down.

Oliver's about to protest until he realizes why she moved, at which point he feels such a strong rush of love for her that it's difficult for him not to tell her (again). The empty chair's back is against a brick wall; it has a direct view of the front entrance, a tactical position if there is such a thing in a neighborhood coffee shop.

"Thank you," Oliver says, unbuttoning his suit jacket as he takes a seat.

She tilts her cup in his direction. "I should be thanking you. I haven't taken a break in hours, which means I haven't had any coffee in hours. Besides, if you were sitting over here, you'd be all nervous and jittery and looking around every five seconds."

It's disarming sometimes, how well she knows him.

"So," she says, crossing her arms on top of the table and giving him her full, undivided attention. "How'd it go?"

Oliver leans back and shrugs. "Well, all things considered. I have access to one of my accounts now, and the mess surrounding QC is slowly getting untangled."

"I'm really glad, Oliver. Make sure you take some of that money and lock it up somewhere no one can ever get to it. Except you, of course, you know, when you need it." She laughs at herself, shakes her head.

"And you," he replies before taking a sip of his coffee.

Felicity looks at him, surprised. "Me?"

"For our nighttime activities."

"Oh, yeah. Of course."

"How are things going with you?" he asks, looking at her laptop and the pile of papers stacked next to it. "You seem busy."

"I am," she sighs. "It's great. Did you know that consulting is awesome? I get to make my own hours, and I can work wherever I want. Like here, for example, surrounded by the heavenly scent of the nectar of the gods."

He laughs a little, but doesn't really feel it. "Tell me what you're working on?"

Felicity flies off into an incredibly animated explanation filled with words that Oliver absolutely does not understand, even after working with her for a couple of years. She's so much smarter than he is, and he loves that about her. He loves the challenge of being around her, the thrill of having to keep up.

She's so happy now, and Oliver is happy _for_ her, really. He just can't help but feel a little sad for himself, because he's been operating under the assumption that he'd get control of QC again and things would go back to the way they were: him as CEO, Felicity as his irreplaceable assistant. He promised himself that this time he'd try harder, learn more. This time, he'd take her advice when she offered it. He was a terrible CEO, but what little good he did? That was all Felicity's doing.

But board rooms and executive suites aren't Felicity's thing; Oliver knew that when he moved her out of IT and he knows it now. She was never this animated talking about spreadsheets and quarterly reports. He realizes that if he gets the second chance he's working so hard for, he's going to be taking it without her. She's instrumental to his career at QC, but he was the worst thing that could've happened to hers.

Because Felicity loves him, she'd put her dreams on hold to help him realize his. And because he loves her, he's not going to ask her to.

Still, the thought of not being around Felicity from nine-to-five makes Oliver uncomfortable, for more reasons than he cares to examine right now. He does know one thing that will help ease his mind.

"I want you to train with Diggle," he says. His voice is rough, and this sounds more like a command than a request. It _is_ non-negotiable, but he's done ordering her around. He takes a deep breath before he continues. "What I mean is that I'd like you to learn how to protect yourself; I should have asked you to do this months ago. If you want to, Diggle can teach you."

Slowly, Felicity nods. "Okay, but…you don't want to teach me?" She's shy when she asks him, looks so small in her chair, fingers fumbling with the hem of her shirt.

"I don't think that's a good idea," Oliver says, and feels a pang of sadness when he sees the hurt in her eyes. What he'd like to tell her is that he thinks it might kill him to be that close to her and not be able to touch her the way he wishes he could. The way he wants to, the way he does when he's dreaming.

What he actually tells her is this: "Diggle's better at training beginners. After Roy, I think I should probably retire from the mentoring business." It's not a lie exactly, but it's not the truth either, and the words leave a sour taste in his mouth.

"Worried that if you teach me your secret island moves I'll be able to bring you to your knees?" Felicity's eyebrows draw together and she shakes her head when she realizes what she just said.

Oliver takes another sip of coffee and smiles, decides not to tell her that she's already very capable of bringing him to his knees.

"Yeah," he says. "Something like that."


	6. Chapter 6

When Oliver comes to, he's lying on the cold metal med table in the lair, a dull, burning pain radiating from his right shoulder. There's a buzz in his ears—kind of distant—but if he listens really hard he can almost make out a few words. Connecting those words into a coherent sentence, though, is something that's beyond him at the moment.

His left arm feels heavy. It's tingling.

"Oliver?" He recognizes the voice, that's a relief.

Oliver squints, lifts his head. The first thing he sees is a mess of blonde hair spilling across his stomach.

"You've been out for a while," Digg says quietly. "She fell asleep waiting for you to wake up."

There's an undercurrent of affection in Digg's voice that makes Oliver smile. That's why his arm feels like lead; Felicity's been using it as a pillow.

"How are you feeling?"

"Like I got shot," Oliver replies, the words slurring together.

Felicity sits up the second Oliver speaks, like she was waiting for his voice to wake her. She stands and presses her hands to his cheeks, says his name just once, and it's laced with panic.

He tries to open his eyes a little more to get a good look at her, and so that she can see he's all right. He's always better when she's near.

"You're okay," she keeps whispering, over and over. Oliver doesn't know if she's trying to convince herself or convince him. Maybe she's saying it for the both of them.

"What happened?" Oliver asks. The details of the night are a little fuzzy, although he suspects that has more to do with whatever Digg used to sedate him than anything else.

"You chased Brickwell into an industrial complex. I was able to hack into the closed circuit TV and saw that it was an ambush. There were three men waiting for you," Felicity says, her voice completely broken. She's crying now, tears falling onto Oliver's chest. "I told you to leave, but you didn't; you wanted to take them out first. You have to leave when I tell you to, Oliver. I can't take care of you if you don't."

Oliver winces as he reaches up and cups her cheek. "Hey," he whispers. "You take care of me."

"You got shot."

He tries to smile. "That's my fault."

Felicity traces the edge of his bandage, her fingertips leaving goosebumps in their wake. "You have to leave when I tell you to, okay? Because I can't…"

She's unable to finish that sentence, but he knows. He _knows_. He can't lose her, either.

Felicity swipes away her tears, regains her composure. "You need to rest."

Oliver nods. He won't argue with her now, he can feel the fatigue settling deep in his bones. "Tell me a story."

"What?" she laughs.

"Tell me a story, please."

Oliver hears a loud metallic clang as she drags her chair closer to him. She covers him with a blanket, slides another pillow under his head. He closes his eyes, breathes her in. She smells like flowers and soap, like everything good in this world.

"Once upon a time, there was a stubborn, headstrong, _deaf_ vigilante…"

He loosely wraps his hand around hers, brings it to rest right over his heart.

He hopes she can feel it. She's the reason it's still beating.


	7. Chapter 7

Oliver knew it was coming. He's been dreading it for months, and he can't say Diggle didn't warn him.

It happens at Table Salt.

He's with McKenna. She's sitting across from him wearing this low-cut red satin gown that draws his eyes to all the right places. He looks—of course he looks—but he feels like shit about it afterwards, which is new for him. Something's off about tonight, but he's not sure what it is. He feels like he shouldn't be here, but McKenna's only in town for a few days and the two of them are old friends. He ignores the part where they dated, it makes this seem worse somehow.

It's just dinner, right?

The sommelier leaves their table and Oliver hears it: Felicity's laugh. His heart just…stops.

He subtly looks to his right—he's the master of subtlety when it matters—and he sees her. She's wearing a figure-hugging nude dress, and her hair is gathered in a curly bundle at the nape of her neck. Her signature glasses are gone, and her red lips are turned up into a graceful, gorgeous smile.

He has no right to look at her the way he looks at her, but he wants her so badly that it actually hurts. He's here with another woman and Felicity's just across the room with her boyfriend, and it's everything Oliver can do to keep breathing. Of course he knows Eddie Raymond exists, and he knows Eddie's been dating Felicity for a little over a month now. Oliver just thought that if he ignored it, it would go away.

Felicity and Eddie are holding hands, slowly leaning in towards each other, and Oliver has to look away because he can't bear to see them kiss. If he sees it, it's real, and Oliver has done such a good job of pretending that it isn't. Now he's come face-to-face with Felicity's love life, and he wasn't expecting it to feel like this.

He's heartbroken.

Felicity's happiness is practically radiating off of her, and that's all Oliver ever wanted for her. The thing is, he can't stand to be around it. Not right now. He thought he could, but he can't. So he decides to run, just like he always has.

Oliver takes a deep breath and quickly slips into his playboy persona. He's a great flirt; he's gotten by on his charm for most of his life, and McKenna plays along. He feeds her a few lines, asks her if she's okay skipping dinner because suddenly he's hungry for something else. He winks, smiles, and takes her hand.

The waiter brings the bill and Oliver pays for the wine they ordered, quietly asks for it to be sent to Felicity's table anonymously. It's a dick move, he's aware of that. She'll know he's the one who sent it; he brought her the same Pontet-Canet the night he showed up at her doorstep with a pizza in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other. He wants her to know he was here. He wants her to think about him while she's kissing Eddie Raymond.

Oliver and McKenna manage to slip out of the restaurant unnoticed. Her hotel is on the other side of the street, and they run across when the traffic breaks. Oliver loses track of the lines he's using on her; he tunes himself out, hates every single word that is coming out of his mouth. He leads her into the elevator, presses her against the wall. God, it's been so long since he kissed someone. Kissing her is warm and familiar, takes him back to a time when things seemed so much easier. Oliver wants easy, he _misses_ easy.

It would be so easy to push open the door to McKenna's room and topple onto the bed. He could hike up her skirt, run his hands along the insides of her thighs; he knows she likes that. He could get lost in her for a couple of hours; she'd make him feel good. She'd make him forget, and it would be so, so _easy_.

Then tomorrow, when he looks in the mirror, he'll hate what he sees. And when he looks at Felicity, he'll be disgusted with himself. Worst of all, he'll be further away from her than ever.

_Felicity_, he thinks, as he kisses a woman who is not her. What is he doing? He gently pushes himself away from McKenna, wipes her taste and her lipstick from his mouth. He apologizes as he walks her to her room, and she's gracious about it. She understands.

He drives to the lair, strips off his suit, then beats the hell out of a one-armed training dummy until the wood is battered and broken and his hands are bleeding.

He leans against the wall and slides down to the floor; he's exhausted, every single bit of fight in his body is drained out of him. Here in the lonely, quiet darkness, he berates himself for the mess he's probably made of things with Felicity. He's ashamed of his earlier behavior, because of the way he treated McKenna and for wanting to remind Felicity of the time they spent together while she was on a date with another man.

He knew it would happen, Digg told him it would.

He just wasn't expecting it to hurt so much.


	8. Chapter 8

Early on a Wednesday afternoon, Felicity calls him crying. She says his name in one quick, choked sob, and then the line goes eerily quiet.

"Felicity?" Oliver impatiently waits for her to say any of the words they'd agreed upon as code to let him know she's in trouble, but she says nothing. His hands begin shaking; his heart nearly pounds out of his chest. "Are you safe?" he asks, panicked. "Are you okay?"

"I'm safe," she manages. "It's not what you think." What follows is the longest stretch of silence of Oliver's life. "But I'm not okay."

"Tell me where you are." He runs to the door as he waits for her answer, wondering if she can hear the edge in his voice, his absolute desperation to get to her.

* * *

Oliver finds her on a hill overlooking a residential neighborhood in the suburbs of Coast City, just off a narrow dirt road. She's sitting in a clearing, hugging her legs to her chest, resting her head on her knees. He parks his car and steps out, pushes down the rising tide of fear when he gets a good look at her. Even without being able to see her face, he can tell that she's just…broken.

"Felicity?" he says tentatively as he approaches her. She looks so incredibly small, and her silence terrifies him.

Not knowing what else to do, Oliver sits down beside her. She's been crying for a while, it seems. Her eyes are swollen and red, ruined mascara is smudged across her eyelids. Her legs are covered in dirt; red streaks of blood are all over her feet. Her shoes are nowhere to be found.

Oliver reaches out and gently rests his hand on the small of her back, tries to hide his hurt when she flinches away from him.

"Did you walk up here from the main road?" he asks dumbly. Of all the questions he has, he asks the least important one?

Felicity nods, her gaze locking with his. She looks so crestfallen that he just has to touch her; he hopes that this time she'll let him. He debates on how to go about it, settles on pushing a strand of hair away from her face, curving his fingers around the shell of her ear as he smooths it back. She takes a deep, shaky breath at the contact, and closes her eyes.

It's not much, but he'll take it.

"Talk to me. _Please_." If he has to beg her, he will.

Oliver's not sure how long they sit there—utterly still and quiet—but eventually she extends her trembling hand, offering him a folded-up piece of paper that's tucked against her palm. He's dying to find out what's written on that paper, but he absolutely does _not_ want to know. It's one of the contradictions he's grown accustomed to after spending so much time with Felicity.

Slowly, he unfolds the paper, and he's shocked by what he sees. It's a printout from the Coast City Tribune archives; the web address is printed on the bottom left corner. A bolded headline sprawls across the top:

**_Local Man Pulls Child From Burning Wreckage_**

Oliver doesn't recognize the name in the caption beneath the photo, but he doesn't need to. The man's eyes—kind and clear—are a mirror image of Felicity's.

That man is her father.

"It's not like I couldn't have found him," she says, her voice completely wrecked. "After he left us, I never looked for him because I was scared of what I would find. A few nights ago I saw this on Eddie's table; it was part of some research he was doing for an article. I knew right away it was him, and…I had to know."

Oliver tries to wrap his arm around her, but it's too much. Felicity moves immediately, puts a foot's worth of distance between them.

She looks away, angrily swipes at her cheeks. He can tell she's trying so hard not to cry again, and he wishes he knew the right thing to say, wishes he knew how to tell her that it's okay to fall apart. She's picked up his broken pieces more times than he can count. If she needs him to, he can put her back together.

Tonight he gets the feeling that she just wants him to listen. So he does.

"He lives in that Craftsman on the corner." Felicity nods at the cluster of houses in the neighborhood below. "He has three kids and a wife named Jessica," she says, and she sounds so bitter and un-Felicity-like that every word she says cuts him. "I fooled myself into believing that he left for some noble reason; or I thought maybe he figured out that he didn't want to be a father. But that wasn't it at all; turns out, he just didn't want to be _my_ father."

Felicity manages to look Oliver in the eye again, searching for something. Whatever it is she's looking for, he hopes she finds it.

She sniffles, wipes her cheek with the cuff of her sleeve. "He left me with a drunk who sent me to school hungry every morning, who could never be bothered to remember my birthday, all so he could have a clean slate. So he could start over like I never even existed," she says, and her voice is very soft, very small.

Oliver doesn't understand how anyone could not want to be around her; he could spend all day listening to her talk, even when he doesn't understand exactly what she's saying. She just brightens up his world, brings light into the darkest places.

Felicity takes the paper from Oliver's hands and rips it to shreds. She tosses it into the wind and they watch it flutter down the hill, tumbling across the overgrowth. Oliver wonders if a few pieces will make it into Felicity's father's yard; it makes him so angry to think that her father will never know how much he missed by not having her in his life. He rubs his fingers together, imagines visiting this man under the cloak of night, nocking an arrow in his bow and pointing it right at him, putting the fear of God into him for being such a selfish bastard.

Felicity knows Oliver though, knows all his tells, so he's not exactly surprised when she gently puts her hand over his, gives him an imploring look and says, "No."

They sit side-by-side until the sunset splashes vivid oranges and pinks across the horizon; until Felicity turns to him and whispers, "Take me home."

* * *

The houses on Felicity's street are sleepy and quiet, and a few porch lights glow out into the inky black night. Oliver unlocked her front door with the spare key she gave him, and now he's left with the delicate task of pulling her out of the car without waking her. He manages to make it as far as lifting her up.

"I can walk," she protests, pushing against his shoulder.

"No," he replies firmly. "There are cuts on your feet and you aren't wearing any shoes. Your hands are okay though, so you can shut the door if you want to help." He tries to sound light, but there's nothing light about this situation.

Oliver carries her through the house and up the stairs, into her bedroom. He sets her down on the edge of the bed, tells her, "Stay here."

He goes into the bathroom, opens Felicity's linen closet and pulls out a few towels, some Band-Aids and antibiotic ointment. After that, he makes his way into her kitchen, looks through her cabinets and pulls out the largest cup he can find. When he returns to her room, she's already changed into a t-shirt and shorts. He's glad of it, that'll make this easier.

Felicity doesn't protest when Oliver lifts her again. This time he carries her into the bathroom, putting her down on the closed toilet lid. He pulls back the shower curtain, turns on the faucet and swishes his fingers under the water. When he's satisfied with the temperature, he bends down and rolls up the legs of his khakis until the cuffs are just below his knees.

Oliver feels Felicity watching him as he steps into the tub, crouching down in front of her. "Swing your legs over." She does.

Oliver fills the cup from the tap, then slowly tips it until the water cascades down Felicity's calves, washing away the dirt. She hisses through her teeth—probably because of the sting—and Oliver quickly apologizes, tells her it will feel better soon. When he's got most of the dirt off, he works a bar of soap into a lather, gently washing around her cuts. There aren't as many as there seemed to be earlier this afternoon, and he's relieved.

"What are you doing?" Her voice is broken and scratchy, and the words tumble out like she's been waiting to ask them for a very long time.

"I'm taking care of you," he replies, rinsing the suds from her tender skin. "Like you take care of me."

He's not sure what makes him do it, and he'll soon wish that he hadn't, but he looks up into her blue, _blue_ eyes and catches a glimpse of himself in them; the self-loathing look of someone who doesn't believe they deserve to be cared for. It hits Oliver like a ton of bricks, and he presses his lips together to keep himself from saying what will inevitably be the wrong thing.

When her legs are clean, he pulls a soft towel off of the counter and pats them dry, all the while wishing she would say something about this afternoon. He's practically desperate to hear her voice again, and he's finally beginning to get a sense of what it must be like for her, waiting for him to open up about the island.

Waiting for him to open up about _anything_, really.

Oliver steps out of the tub and kneels on the floor before her, bringing the pad of her foot to rest against his thigh. He dispenses a healthy strip of antibiotic ointment onto his finger and gets to work applying it to each of her wounds. Working in silence for so long, Oliver gets into a bit of a rhythm. He's so focused on his work that he's startled when Felicity finally speaks.

"I ran after him the day he left," she says.

He doesn't dare look up at her for fear that she'll stop talking.

"I chased his car half a mile down a gravel road in my bare feet." She sniffles, but the tears don't fall. Not this time. "He didn't even look back."

Oliver tugs at the collar of his shirt and rubs his eyes with it, swallowing against the lump in his throat. He doesn't understand what good he did in this life to make him lucky enough to cross paths with this woman. He will never, ever understand it.

"I hopped on the train this morning thinking I would tell him about everything he missed, you know? I wanted to tell him how angry I am with him for leaving me, for just…not wanting anything to do with me. But I couldn't do it. I couldn't knock; I didn't want him to know that I care enough to be upset about it." She brings her hands up to her head, rubs her temples in slow, steady circles. "It was a really stupid thing to do in the first place."

"It was brave," he says, flattening a Band-Aid along the inside of her ankle.

"I didn't even knock, Oliver."

He takes a deep breath, calculates the exact words he's going to say and the order in which he's going to say them. He wants to make sure he gets this right.

"When you want something for a long time, and you realize that it's not the right thing, that it's not good for you? It takes a lot of strength to walk away from that," he tells her, quietly adding, "It's very brave."

Felicity worries her bottom lip between her teeth as she tears up again, and Oliver could kick himself for managing to mess that one up.

"I'm so tired of loving people who don't love me back."

The _I love you_ is right there on Oliver's tongue. It would be so easy to say it, it actually _hurts_ not to. The first time he told her he loved her, he let her believe it was a lie; he'll be damned if she thinks the second time is out of pity.

Instead, he crooks his fingers beneath her chin, slides the pad of his thumb across the skin there as he tilts her head up so he can look her right in the eye.

Her expression is completely blank, and this? This is the part of loving her that absolutely terrifies him; this is the reason why he's not sure he'll ever let himself tell her how he really feels about her. He has a terrible track record when it comes to relationships, and if he were responsible for this look, he would never forgive himself. Extinguishing her light is one thing he knows he could never come back from.

"People love you, Felicity." He says it so earnestly, wishes those words could sink down deep, right into her bones. "So many people love you."

"Yeah," she whispers. "Just not the ones who are supposed to."

* * *

Felicity's tucked into bed, and Oliver's just standing over her, not sure what to do next. She's always guiding him, leading the way. He feels like he's bungling this.

"Do you want me to call Eddie?"

"No."

Oliver wants to ask why, but decides against it.

"Will you stay?" she asks, wrapping her fingers around his wrist and pulling him down until he's perched beside her.

"Of course."

Oliver reaches over and cradles the back of her head, gently glides his thumb over her temple. It's not long before her breathing evens out, and he's sure she's fast asleep. He wishes he could crawl in behind her and wrap her in his arms. He wants to protect her so badly, but he's beginning to accept the fact that there are always going to be things he can't protect her from.

* * *

Oliver's the first to wake in the morning.

He slips out of her guest room and into the kitchen, where he assembles the ingredients for pancakes and manages to do a fairly respectable job of following the recipe he Googled on his phone. He decides not to tell her about the first few burnt ones he stuffed down the garbage disposal.

Felicity pads into the kitchen after he pours the last of the batter into the skillet.

"What are you doing?" She punctuates the question with a yawn, runs her fingers through her messy hair.

Her eyes are still a bit red, and her pajamas are a wrinkled mess. She's all rumpled and tired-looking, but Oliver thinks she's beautiful. He can't help but smile at her.

"I'm making pancakes."

That perks her up. "With chocolate chips?"

"Do you really need to ask?"

Oliver piles a plate—probably a little too high—with pancakes and sets them on the table. Felicity pulls out a chair and sits, doesn't waste any time cutting into her breakfast. It's probably been a while since she's had anything to eat.

Oliver takes a seat across from her and digs in. Not bad for a first try, he thinks. Maybe they'll get a chance to do this over again someday, and he'll get it perfect that time.

Felicity regards him thoughtfully, nervously twisting her napkin in her hands. "Thank you for coming for me yesterday."

There's an edge to her voice, like she thinks he did her a favor. What she doesn't seem to get is that he doesn't have a choice in the matter, and maybe he never did. If she needs him? He'll be there. Nothing can stop him. He hopes that one of these days he'll be able to make her understand that.

He reaches across the table and cups her cheek. "Hey," he whispers tenderly, and the sound of his voice draws her attention. "I will always come for you."

She nods, takes a deep breath.

"I know."


	9. Chapter 9

Hello! I'm going out of town tomorrow for 4th of July weekend, which is something I hadn't taken into consideration when I committed to updating daily, so, I'm going to try very hard to continue, but the daily updates *might* be spotty until Sunday. I'll definitely resume them then, hopefully before. All of you have been so kind with your comments, and I'm sorry I haven't had a chance to respond to them yet. I will! I hope you stick with me and continue enjoying the story (we're a little over halfway there)!

* * *

The next time Oliver sees his sister, he's staring at the blade of an arrow that's nocked in her bow, pointed right at the center of his chest. Anger and hatred is etched all over her face, and there's a moment when he almost tells her to let go of the cable. Almost, until he remembers a night, months and months ago, when he made a promise to Felicity.

He has to tell Thea the truth.

"Speedy." His voice is full of sadness and affection, he hasn't called her that in so long. She hasn't been around to hear it.

When Oliver found out that Malcolm Merlyn had returned to Starling City with his sister, he wondered if Malcolm had revealed his secret. There were so many ways he could torture Oliver if he had, so many ways he could torture Oliver if he hadn't. Oliver knows now that he didn't. He can see the confusion in Thea's eyes, even behind her mask. Her stance only wavers slightly as she processes what he just said.

"What?" she breathes. "How do you know that name…"

Oliver drops to his knees and pulls back his hood. It's a stupid thing to do here on the crime-filled streets of his city, but tonight, he doesn't care. He's risked her life to hide his secret for so long, it's only fitting that he risks his life when he reveals it. She lost everything because of his secrets: her mother, her boyfriend, her life.

If someone sees his face…let them.

He tells her everything; the words spill out from him without much rhyme or reason, he just thinks of all the things he's hidden from her over the years—the things that matter—and he lists them, one by one. If he holds back, thinks too long about what he's doing, he'll never get this out. He cries as he tells her how sorry he is, when he begs for her forgiveness. He tells her he loves her, that he did it because he loves her, that he was wrong and he is so, so sorry.

He stares at his hands as the rain starts to fall, wondering if there will ever come a time in his life when he'll stop hurting the women he loves. "Please Thea," he whispers. "Please forgive me."

When he looks up, she's gone.

He doesn't know how long he stays there, just kneeling on the street in an abandoned alleyway in the Glades.

"Oliver?"

He flinches when Felicity says his name; he'd forgotten he left his comms on. But he's glad to hear her voice; it pulls him out of the darkness. It calls him home.

* * *

When Oliver returns to the lair, he finds Roy practicing his aim, barreling arrows into targets. Ever since the cure took away his brute strength, Roy's had to hone other skills. Under Oliver's tutelage, he's become a fair archer, but he still needs to work on his form.

"Plant your feet," Oliver says, gently kicking against Roy's heel to widen his stance. "You'll never hit the bullseye if you don't have a strong foundation."

Roy takes Oliver's advice and fires an arrow that lands just inside the white circle, narrowly missing dead center. He grins at Oliver, tries it again. And again. He gets into a rhythm.

"I'm sorry that I asked you to lie to Thea," Oliver says without any preamble; he just blurts it out, even though he rehearsed exactly what he wanted to say over and over on his ride back to the lair. "About what we do here." _About anything_, he thinks. "I know how difficult it is to hide who you are from the people you love."

Roy just looks at him, completely dumbfounded.

Oliver hands him a piece of paper with an address scrawled on it. "She's staying here, and she's not alone. We got Merlyn, but there are others."

Looking down at the paper, Roy shrugs. Asks, "What do you want me to do with this?" Oliver knows that Roy still loves his sister. Right now, he's trying to give him the gift of a second chance. "If you want to see her, want to talk to her, be smart about it; wait it out until she's alone. Don't just go barging in, okay?"

Roy's not as hot-headed as he once was, but Oliver feels the need to remind him of that every once in a while.

"Why are you doing this?" Roy asks.

"I've made a lot of mistakes," Oliver explains, putting his hand on Roy's shoulder. "And I'm trying to fix them."

Roy takes a deep breath and shoves the paper in his pocket, shoots a few more arrows before he heads to the steps. He offers Oliver a sincere thank you, then walks upstairs, securing the door behind him.

For the first time since he returned, Oliver looks at Felicity. She's standing just a couple steps away from her computer, watching him with an expression that almost looks like…pride? No, that can't be it.

"She hates me," he says, shoulders slumping as he finally allows himself to feel the disappointment he'd been ignoring since he saw Thea. He didn't expect her to forgive him right away, but he'd hoped, which was something he rarely allowed himself to do.

Felicity grins softly and shakes her head as she walks toward him. "She doesn't hate you, Oliver. She's angry. She has every right to be angry."

"What if she never stops?"

Drawing a deep breath, Felicity closes what little gap there is between them and puts her hand on his arm. "If she never stops, then that's her choice, and there are some things you can't change. But you were honest with her, and you owed her that. That's the first step, you know? You took it, that's good. Keep taking steps. Let her know how much you love her, how sorry you are, every chance you get. If you do that, the forgiveness will follow."

Oliver nods, still having difficulty facing the fact that he cant make things happen by sheer force of will. If he could, so many things in his life would be different.

"Give her some time. She has years of hurt to work through, and mountains of lies to come to terms with. She'll come looking for you when she's on the other side."

"I don't know what I'll do if she doesn't," he admits. It's difficult for him to even face that possibility.

"You love her, and, despite everything, she loves you. It'll work itself out." When Felicity looks at him like this, all positivity and light, he can't help but believe her.

She winds her arms around his neck and unlike all the times before, Oliver doesn't think twice about holding her close. He relaxes into her, feels the knot of tension he's been carrying around loosen as she gently scratches the hair along his nape. Just that simple motion makes his knees feel weak, and for a few beautiful seconds he takes down all the barriers he's put between them and buries his head into the crook of her neck. His lips softly skim her collarbone and she stiffens, lets out a short, surprised breath.

Oliver panics and steps away, all too aware that he's taken it too far, dragged his toes over that careful line the two of them are always walking right along the edge of.

She has a boyfriend, and even though Oliver's making progress, he's not ready for everything that admitting to loving Felicity will bring into his life. Moments like this though—the ones where she allows him to confess his weakness, admit that he's scared—they bring him closer.

Felicity gives him a shy smile, letting him know that they're still okay. It doesn't really bring him any comfort.

She packs up her things and says goodnight, leaves him in the corner of the dark basement alone, sharpening his arrows. It hurts, watching her go.

He's jumped out of a building to keep her safe; he'd take a bullet for her.

He just wishes he was brave enough to ask her to stay.


	10. Chapter 10

Oliver notices the change in Felicity's working hours right away; she goes from leaving the lair around nine or ten every night to staying past midnight, sometimes later. Oliver likes having her company more than he probably should, that's why it takes him nearly two weeks to ask her about her schedule change. He doesn't want to rock the boat, but he's curious.

It's close to eleven-thirty, and Felicity's sitting at her computers, monitoring a few searches that she set up earlier in the week. Her bare feet are resting on the edge of her desk, and she's polishing off a small container of lo mien that Diggle brought in from the take-out place just down the street.

It's just the two of them now. Digg went home a couple of hours ago to spend some quality time with Lyla and their son. Roy left shortly after, muttering something about being tired. Oliver suspects he's been meeting up with Thea, but he doesn't ask. It isn't any of his business.

"You're here late tonight," Oliver says as he slides an arrow into his quiver.

Felicity tosses her chopsticks into the empty container, then swivels her chair until she's facing him. "Look who's paying attention to the time now," she says, teasing. "If only you had gotten into that habit when I was your EA, you would've made my life so much easier."

"Felicity," he replies, laughing. "You're avoiding my question."

Her eyes narrow, and she gives him this scrutinizing look so intense that he thinks maybe she can see past his skin and bones, right to the heart of him. A few months ago, such a look would've made him turn away. It makes him nervous now, but he doesn't flinch.

"Why don't you ask what you really want to ask?"

Oliver should be used to her calling him out by now, but he's not; he doesn't know if he ever will be. Still, he manages to keep his breathing steady. Inhale, exhale. This can be easy, he can make it sound casual.

"Is everything okay between you and Eddie?" Yeah, making it sound casual? Not really a thing Oliver's good at.

Felicity laughs, and it's a short, bitter thing. "I wouldn't say that, no."

"What happened?"

"We broke up," she replies.

Relief just washes right over him, which makes him feel like an ass. He doesn't want Felicity to be hurting, and it's not like he's ready to take Eddie's place. Despite his personal feelings on the matter, he tries to be a good friend.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Felicity looks down at her feet and seems kind of unsure about the whole situation. Eventually she sighs and shrugs. "There isn't really anything to talk about. He thought I was cheating on him, and we ended things."

Oliver sits back, stunned. He hates to admit this—even to himself—but he _knows_ cheating. He and cheating were good, good friends in a previous life. He knows what it looks like, the lies it tells. Felicity would never—no, _could_ never do such a thing.

"Why would he think that?"

Slowly, Felicity's eyes meet his. He knows she's hesitant about something, maybe embarrassed about what she's going to say. "Because I told him there was someone else."

Oliver's pretty sure he's going to pass out. The way she's looking at him, he can't help but wonder…does she know how he feels about her? His heart is pounding, blood rushing everywhere but to his brain; he thinks he might topple right out of his chair.

Felicity rolls her eyes at him. "Relax, Oliver. He doesn't think it's you. I've managed to avoid that particular kind of gossip ever since I stopped working at Queen Consolidated."

"I wasn't worried about that," he tells her. What he wants to say is that he wouldn't have minded if Eddie thought that about him, but this is absolutely not the time to say something like that. Truthfully, Oliver never minded those rumors at QC, but he hated the way they made Felicity feel, the way that they made people look at her. He won't let that happen to her again, not because of him.

She sighs. "I know, I messed up, it was my fault."

"I don't believe that," Oliver says, shaking his head.

"Remember when we were tracking that guy smuggling drugs through the docks a few weeks ago?"

Oliver reluctantly nods, not really understanding what that drug-smuggling ring has to do with Felicity's love life.

"Eddie and I were supposed to meet for dinner that night, and with everything we had going on here, I knew I wouldn't be able to make it. I had to think of some kind of excuse, so I told him I was at the library doing some research for a contract I was working on." Felicity takes a deep breath, twirls the end of her ponytail around her finger. "It had been a few days since we'd seen each other, so he wanted to surprise me. He brought dinner over there, and when he couldn't find me, he called and asked where I was. I was kind of distracted; you were on your way back here with that stab wound. I told him I was in the stacks looking for a book. At that point, I mean…I was busted.

"He was waiting for me when I got home that night. He told me I'd been acting strange, and I guess I had. It's hard keeping this secret, you know? Of course you know. He asked me if there was someone else, and I said yes. I didn't know what else to do, I mean, I was worried that if I tried to deny it that he'd have me followed, and then we'd get found out. He's a reporter, he's curious about everything. So," she says, shrugging. "We ended it."

"Felicity," he whispers, shaking his head. "I don't want you lying for me."

She looks at him like he's grown seven additional heads. "Are you serious right now? I lie for you every day."

"I know," Oliver replies. "But not like that."

"Technically, it wasn't a lie anyways. There _is_ someone else: The Arrow. I mean, it's not romantic, so it's not 'someone else' in the usual 'someone else' kind of way, but I didn't _really_ lie."

Oliver rubs his hand over his face, needing just a moment to think about what his next move is going to be. He knows what it _should_ be. Ah, hell. "If this is too much-"

"Don't," Felicity says, interrupting him. She puts her hand out, like she's 100% done with him and his noble, self-sacrificing intentions.

"This is your _life_, Felicity. I need you here, but-"

"Did you hear what you just said? This is _my_ life. Mine. I know what I'm doing. Stop acting like I'm here out of some obligation to you, or like you're keeping me here against my will, okay? It's…it's hurtful."

"Okay," Oliver says, swallowing all the protests that are right there on the tip of his tongue. He wishes he could tell her that he didn't give her an out to convince her to leave, he gave her an out so she would convince him she was going to stay. He needs to hear it every once in a while; he doesn't want to do any of this without her, but he worries about her resolve. Sometimes he wonders just how much she can take.

"It wasn't working out anyway. We took a break a couple of months ago, then decided to give it another go. It would've ended eventually."

"Is there anything I can do?" Oliver asks.

She smiles, and it's dazzling in its soft sincerity; very _Felicity._ "A week ago I would've asked you to keep my freezer stocked with a few pints of ice cream, now I'm past the 'eating my feelings' phase. But thank you for asking."

"Maybe when you're up for it we could have another pizza night?" He barely recognizes his own voice; the hopeful, almost shy tone to it is completely foreign to him.

"Sure, I'd like that. You know, we didn't need to stop having them in the first place."

"It would've looked bad," Oliver explains. "Me coming over to your house while you had a boyfriend."

Felicity's eyebrows scrunch up, like he's just spoken to her in another language. "Why? We're just friends."

Oliver understands that he and Felicity are many things, but 'just' doesn't apply to a single one of them.

"Yeah," he replies, looking down at his hands. "We're friends."


	11. Chapter 11

It's supposed to be a simple mission. Oliver and Felicity infiltrate a charity gala being held at the home of one of Starling City's philanthropic elite. Donald Ramsay, an old money shipping magnate, is running a pyramid scheme disguised as a charity that's stripping the residents of the Glades of a much-needed helping hand.

Oliver and Felicity are getting ready to sneak out of the ballroom to find Ramsay's private office when a group of masked men barge in and rain down a hail of gunfire. A stray bullet slices through Felicity's abdomen; Oliver doesn't even have enough time to step in front of it.

She just looks at him with wide, surprised eyes, and his whole world stops turning.

Oliver frantically yells into his comms, begging Diggle to pull the car around and hurry, _hurry_. He trusts his partner more than the paramedics, and he knows that they have minutes, _maybe_.

Felicity loses consciousness after Diggle pulls out of the driveway, and Oliver cradles her in the back seat, whispering soothing words in her ear, begging her not to leave him. He presses his palm hard against her side, where deep crimson blooms across her pale pink dress. He can't stop the bleeding.

He pleads with Diggle to drive faster, even though he knows Digg's as desperate to get Felicity to the hospital as he is.

"Please," Oliver whispers through his sobs. "Please." He's not even talking to anyone in particular; he's just hoping someone somewhere will listen. He's hoping that for once, time will be on his side.

While Felicity's in surgery, Oliver scrubs his hands until the skin is raw and red and Diggle drags him out of the bathroom.

It doesn't matter. They won't _ever_ be clean.

* * *

The waiting room is eerily quiet this time of night, especially considering there was just a mass shooting at a mansion a few miles away. Oliver knows that must mean Felicity was one of the lucky ones—maybe the lucky _one_—to make it out of there alive.

He can't stop fidgeting. A nervous energy has settled over him, and he's constantly moving. His legs are bouncing, he keeps winding his fingers back, like he's nocking an invisible arrow. How does Felicity do this? Just sit by his side and hold his hand as she waits for him to come back to the land of the living?

"Oliver," Digg says quietly. "Getting yourself all wound up isn't going to help her."

"How could I not be wound up, Digg? She's in there because of-"

"She is _not_ in there because of you. She's in there because a group of men thought they'd settle a score by opening fire on a crowd of innocent people."

"A crowd she was a part of because of me," Oliver says, then rubs his face with his hands.

"No, man. When are you going to get it?" Digg replies angrily. "She's in there because she made a choice to be a part of this team, and she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. You can't keep blaming yourself for _her_ choices. Would you want her blaming herself every time you get hurt, because she couldn't get you some tracking data fast enough or because she missed something that no one was looking for?"

"Of course not. Felicity does everything she can to-"

"Keep you safe?" Digg asks.

"Yeah."

"And you don't do the same for her?"

Oliver looks at his friend, sees the understanding in his eyes. "I would've taken that bullet for her if I'd known it was coming."

Diggle pats him on the shoulder and offers him a soft smile. "But you didn't, and that's okay."

Oliver stands, shoves his hands in his pockets, hoping to stave off the restlessness. He peers out the waiting room window, down an empty hall, praying for footsteps.

"How do you do it?" he asks, turning to Diggle.

"Do what?"

Oliver takes a deep breath, looks at the floor. "Handle Lyla doing field work for A.R.G.U.S.? Now that you have the baby, how can you breathe at night?"

Digg leans forward, rests his elbows on his knees. "We met while we were at war, Oliver. We take risks, it's who we are. Sure, we could sit behind computers all day and be perfectly safe, but we'd be miserable. What kind of example would that set for our son?"

"But what about…" Oliver shrugs, trying to find the right words. "What about our enemies?"

As he shakes his head, Diggle gets this amused half smile on his face. "You spend so much time looking over your shoulder, worried about what's coming next, that you take your biggest enemy for granted every day. And it gets you every damn time."

Oliver looks over at his friend, completely confused.

"Life, Oliver. _Life_."

"What do you mean?"

"I get why you're always waiting for the other shoe to drop. You've lost a lot, no one can blame you. No matter how much you try to protect the people you love, you cannot stop life. Yeah, this mission went wrong, but tomorrow Felicity could get in a car accident. She could slip on a spill at the grocery store and hit her head the wrong way, and that's it. You can't stop life from happening, Oliver. You can't plan for everything."

Oliver takes a minute, tries to absorb every word that Diggle's telling him right now. He's always been so focused on shackling his loved ones' pain to his ankles that he never stopped to think about all the ways they could be hurt without him.

In the end, though, Oliver knows that if Felicity doesn't make it out of that operating room, he'll never be able to forgive himself. "I can't lose her, Diggle," he says. He can't lose her to a madman's bullet, he can't lose her to another man, and he can't lose her because of one of his inevitable romantic screw-ups. "I can't."

"See," Dig says, shaking his head. "That's the thing that Lyla and I understand, and you don't. Not yet. You _are_ going to lose her, Oliver. Maybe it'll happen tonight, and maybe it'll happen fifty years from now. You can't control it, it simply is. What you can control is what happens between now and then, you know? You can sacrifice your future because you think you have to make up for things you did in your past. Or, you can be happy. If you never get to see Felicity or talk to her again, are you going to be glad that you kept her at arm's length? That you never let her know how you feel? It will eat at you for the rest of your life, man. Don't do that to yourself.

"So, how do I do it? I tell Lyla how much I love her every day, and then I go out and try to make the world a better place for our son to grow up in. If something happens to her? Happens to me? I'd have no regrets, because my life was pretty perfect for a while."

Oliver feels the bitter sting of tears behind his eyes, quickly rubs them away. He longs for the happiness he sees on Diggle's face, wishes he could reach out and grab it. But he can't think about happiness when Felicity's a hundred feet away from him, fighting for her life. She'll win that fight, she has to. Otherwise, Oliver doesn't know what's going to be waiting for him on the other side. "I love her, Diggle." He quickly shakes his head, allows the words he's always holding back to just…find their way out. It takes a moment, but they come. "I'm _in_ love with her."

Digg sighs and smiles at his friend. "I know. You should try telling her that sometime."

* * *

It takes Felicity three days to wake up.

Oliver's sleeping in a chair by her bedside when it happens; his arm is sprawled out across her waist. He's brought back into awareness by her fingertips sliding across his scalp, gently tugging strands of his hair. He nestles into her touch, feeling comforted in a way he hasn't since he thought he'd lost her. Then he remembers the look on the surgeon's face when he walked into the waiting room, he remembers the pale color of Felicity's lips as she slept. He remembers, he remembers…

He sits up, confused. He blinks, because he can't believe his eyes. He just can't believe it.

"Hi," she says. Her voice is raspy, but Oliver doesn't care; it's the most beautiful sound he's ever heard.

"Hi," he manages shakily. "I thought I was gonna lose you."

She smiles and weakly shakes her head. "You're not gonna lose me. I'm not going anywhere, okay?"

Felicity has endless amounts of patience with him, always knows exactly how to read him, how to handle his fears.

"Okay," he breathes. He reaches out for her, rests his forehead against their entwined fingers. He believes—for the first time since he escaped that island—that everything's going to be all right.

* * *

Felicity's hospital room is filled with flowers that are bright and alive just like she is. There are arrangements from Digg and Lyla, Laurel, Detective Lance. Sara sent a few card games over, Roy brought Felicity her tablet.

Oliver's slumped in the chair next to Felicity's bed; his body is exhausted but his mind is working overtime, filled to bursting with _possibilities_.

He can't stop looking at her; just the simple rise and fall of her chest is a miracle, and he wants to be present for every second of it. Watching her get better, watching the color flood her cheeks again, makes him wonder about a lifetime of this. A lifetime of close calls and scrapes and emergency rooms. A lifetime of the two of them watching each other teeter on the brink of death, over and over again.

He wonders how long they can do it, wonders when their luck will run out and the law will come looking for them. He wonders when would be a good time to hang it all up.

"I know what you're thinking," Felicity says, swiping her finger across her tablet as she bests the computer at another game of solitaire. She starts to pump her fist in the air, then thinks better of it.

Oliver smiles. "Pretty sure you don't."

"You're trying to figure out how to tell me that you're not going to let me go out in the field again," she says, and she already sounds all fired-up about it, like she's been thinking of a way to start this argument for hours.

"No," he replies, resting his elbows on her mattress. "I am absolutely not doing that."

Her eyes widen, then she scoots up in the bed a bit, squares her shoulders. "Okay."

Oliver looks down at the bed sheet, twists the edge in his palm. "I wish I would've been fast enough to get in front of you in time."

She caresses the strained muscles on the back of his hand with the pad of her thumb, until he loosens up enough to let go. "Look at me," she whispers.

It takes him a few seconds, but he does. There's so much love in her eyes, he doesn't know how to talk himself out of it. He's not even going to try.

"I wouldn't change a thing about that night. You're safe, and I'm…"

"Amazing," Oliver says.

"I thought I was remarkable," she teases.

"That, too." _More than I deserve,_ is what he doesn't say.

She grins at him, a little lopsided and goofy, and he can't help but smile back. It feels as good as it can with her in a hospital bed, all stitched up.

"I guess we're just two idiots ready to take bullets for each other."

He hates that she says it so casually, but…he's beginning to accept it. "I guess."

"There are worse things."

"Yeah," he replies, taking her hand. "There are."


	12. Chapter 12

Oliver's at Felicity's house for another pizza-night-slash-keep-an-eye-on-the-recovering-gunshot-victim extravaganza when Digg knocks on the door, hands Oliver his son, and promises he'll be right back.

Shortly thereafter, all hell breaks loose, because Digg and Lyla's kid? He has a pair of lungs on him.

"Where _is_ he?" Felicity asks as she bounces Diggle's screaming child on her lap. J.J.'s face is all scrunched up and miserable-looking, and it'd be cute, really, if the crying weren't so earsplittingly loud. "He said forty-five minutes, tops. It's been, like, a hundred years."

Oliver smiles, sits down on the corner of Felicity's coffee table, right across from where she's propped up on the couch. "Digg'll be back soon. Want me to take him?"

Felicity nods, a frantic look in her eyes. She makes a move to get up, but Oliver puts a stop to that with a simple hand on her shoulder. Her wound is still healing; her doctor told her not to do any lifting.

Oliver cradles J.J. to his chest somewhat awkwardly, shushing him quietly as he rubs slow circles on his back. He means for it to be comforting, but it just seems to piss the kid off.

"What should I do?" Helplessness overwhelms Oliver. He _hates_ this feeling.

Felicity shrugs. "Why are you asking me?"

"I…I thought you'd know."

"Why, because I'm a woman?" she asks, annoyed.

Despite his best efforts, sometimes Oliver just steps _right_ in it.

"No," he replies, shaking his head. He takes a minute to think about the following words very carefully. "Because you're…_you_."

Blushing, Felicity looks down at her lap. She says, very quietly, "Oh. I don't know much about babies."

* * *

After Diggle stops by and picks up J.J., it takes a while for the frenzied atmosphere to even out again. Oliver and Felicity sit on opposite ends of her couch; Felicity's thumbing through a magazine with her feet on Oliver's lap. He massages the soles, feels the tension drain from her muscles. Jeopardy's on in the background, and Felicity calls out the answers to random questions. She always gets them right, and Oliver just watches her in awe.

"We should've gotten you on this show back when I was destitute, so you could win some money for the Arrow Operation Fund," he teases as he works out a particularly tight knot.

Felicity peers up at him over the rim of her glasses, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "I was on the Teen Tournament in high school," she says casually.

Oliver just gapes at her. "Seriously?"

"I lived in a trailer park in Las Vegas. How do you think I paid for MIT? Well, my living expenses, anyway," she adds quickly.

Oliver knows how she paid for her education; he remembers the sum total of her loan balances when he paid them off last year (anonymously, of course). It's one of those things where she knows he did it and he knows that she knows, and they absolutely do not talk about it. Besides, that education has saved his ass a thousand times over. Why shouldn't he pay for it?

She grins at him and he grins back, and he's struck by how domestic this whole thing is. The two of them lounging after dinner, just being together, comfortable with each other when they're talking and when they aren't. Not too long ago this would've scared the hell out of him. Now he just…wants it. Always.

Felicity reaches over and grabs a Post-It, marking a page in the magazine that she wants to come back to later. She picks up a pen, writes something, then absentmindedly twirls it between her fingers. Watching her like this—unguarded and beautiful—is quickly becoming one of Oliver's favorite pastimes. He feels a warm surge of affection for her, and he doesn't try to ignore it or push it away, he just lets it be. It's a perfect, peaceful feeling.

But it doesn't take long for that ever-present fear to start fraying the edges of his happiness. He used to be consumed by the thought that the Slades and the Clock Kings of the world would always be lurking in the periphery, threatening to take her from him. He still is; he doesn't think that will ever go away. But there's another enemy, one that's not so easy to defeat: himself.

Specifically, years and years of his secrets.

The things that he did and the things that happened to him while he was away are easier to tell her about, because there's an inherent forgiveness in admitting to the ugliness of survival. The reasons he did what he did don't make those things any less awful, but most people understand.

It's his actions before the island that are going to get him. If he lets them.

Slowly, he's been opening up, showing Felicity the ugliest parts of his past. She always accepts the things he admits to with love and understanding, knowing that he's no longer the person he was before he stepped onto the Gambit. The things Ollie did before the island are things Oliver is ashamed of now. He'd give anything to right those wrongs, and Felicity knows that.

The thing that Oliver has realized in the year since he first told her he loved her is that Felicity is _it_ for him, and when he takes that step from friendship to forever, he's got to be all in. He's not quite there yet, because his secrets have a way of coming to light, and if he keeps something from her, there will be no coming back. Losing her trust would devastate him; losing her when he could've stopped it from happening? He'd never survive it.

Oliver watches as Felicity flips a page and pulls out another Post-It, and he remembers what she told him all those months ago about figuring out why he keeps his secrets.

He knows he keeps this one to protect himself; he keeps this one because he's ashamed. He's not sure why he decides to tell her on this night in particular; maybe it's because J.J. was here and he's thinking about how close he came to having that life. Maybe it's because he loves Felicity, and he just wants her to know.

The words bounce around in his head, and he puzzles over how he's going to bring it up. In the end he decides that sugarcoating this isn't going to soften the blow, so he just says it, as his thumb works its way across the arch of her foot.

"I got a girl pregnant," he says, as all the air rushes out of him. "Before the island, when I was with Laurel."

Felicity knows he was a cheat then, just as much as she knows he'd _never_ cheat now. He's grateful he doesn't have to explain that part of it, but the way she's staring at him isn't really all that comforting. Not that he expects it to be…not that it _should_ be, but…yeah.

"She lost it a few days after we found out." He's surprised at how much it still hurts, knowing that he'd helped make a person that he never got to meet.

Felicity's expression softens. "I'm sorry."

The words are soothing in an unexpected sort of way. "Thank you."

"Did you want it?"

"No. Yes," he says. "For a little while, after."

She gives him a sad smile. "Life's funny that way, isn't it?"

Oliver nods. "It wasn't for the right reasons. I thought being a father might help me mature, force me to become a man. I thought having a kid might make me less of a screw-up."

"That's a lot of responsibility to put on a baby's shoulders," she says.

"Yeah. I wasn't ready. The first thing I did when I found out was go crying to my mother about how it wasn't fair that my life would be ruined by one mistake. I had it all wrong, you know?" he says, looking over at her. "I'm the one who would've ruined his life."

Felicity gives him this unwavering look, full of…something Oliver can't quite figure out. It's nice though, that she _sees_ him. She never makes him feel judged.

"Does Laurel know?"

Oliver slowly shakes his head, looking down at the floor. "I hid it because I didn't want her to know I had cheated on her. When I came back…I don't know, there didn't seem to be much point to telling her. I mean, it wouldn't surprise her; she knows who I am. But it would hurt her."

"She knows who you _were_," Felicity corrects him.

Oliver lets that sink in for a moment, but isn't quite sure how to respond to it. He just squeezes her foot, lets her know that he heard her, that he understands.

"I never spoke to her again," he whispers.

"You didn't?"

"No," he replies quietly. "She called me to tell me she lost the baby, and she couldn't wait to get off the phone with me. I offered to help her, to…I don't even know what I was thinking. She just didn't want to talk to me, not that I blame her."

"She was upset, Oliver. Maybe she was…"

She doesn't finish that statement, and when Oliver looks over, she's staring at her lap, twisting her fingers together.

"Maybe she was what?"

Felicity takes a deep breath. "Maybe she was relieved, and maybe she felt bad about it."

"Maybe," he admits. "_I_ was relieved. And sad, and a lot of things. Isn't that terrible? To be relieved about something like that?"

He watches Felicity, hoping for an answer. If she tells him it's not terrible, he'll believe her. He hopes she'll absolve him of that, at least. But she's quiet for a long time, picking at the edges of her purple nail polish.

"I don't think it's terrible," she says quietly. "I felt relieved when it happened to me."

Oliver's stomach drops; he can't think of a single thing she could say that would shock him more in this moment. Felicity must read it on him, because she's quick to explain.

"I was a sophomore in college, and I had been dating a guy for a while. He was the great-on-paper type, but he didn't love me. He was close, I think, but he never quite got there. We were always safe, you know? And it surprised me. When I told him, he took off. I took twelve tests," she says with a nervous laugh. "I had them all lined up in a row on the edge of my bathroom counter, and I sat on the floor, crying."

He remembers that being the worst part, the waiting. He and Sandra sat on the side of her bed, several feet between them as the small kitchen timer she held in her hands ticked away. They didn't speak to each other, but he wasn't alone, and he feels so…_angry_ for Felicity. All his life he's had people stick by him, even when they shouldn't have. Felicity, she's the most beautiful person he's ever known—both inside and out—and she's spent so much of her life on her own.

Oliver reaches over to where Felicity's arm is resting on the back of the sofa, and he threads his fingers through hers, gives her a soft, reassuring smile. He wants to be the person in her life who always loves her, who never leaves. He wants to be the one she relies on.

He wants so much for her, from her, with her. He wonders if she can feel it. He hopes she can, especially now.

"I couldn't get an appointment at the health center for two days, but by the time it rolled around," she swallows and shrugs, looks like the weight of the world is on her shoulders. "It didn't matter anymore; it was…gone. And I was relieved, you know? When I found out, all I could think about was how happy my mother would be to find out that I got knocked up and had to drop out of college."

"You wouldn't have dropped out," he tells her, full of conviction. "If anyone would've finished under those circumstances, it's you." What he doesn't tell her is that he hopes, truly hopes, that he never comes face-to-face with her mother.

"I would've resented it," she whispers. "And she would've grown up just like I did."

"Felicity," he says softly, as he reaches over and cups her cheek. "Hey. That's not possible. You would never."

_I would_, he thinks, but he knows this isn't the right time to tell her. If Sandra hadn't lost the baby, Oliver would've stayed. And he would've resented the hell out of that.

"Yeah?"

He nods, he's never been more sure of anything in his life. "Yeah."

They're quiet for a long while before Felicity speaks again.

"I guess things have a way of working out."

Oliver agrees. The worst moments of his life led him right to Felicity, and he can't find it in himself to regret that.

"Maybe one day we'll get a second chance," Felicity says. "I mean, not you and me _we_, but us. Separately."

She's so flustered, and Oliver just smiles at her like a goofball. She always manages to do that: make him smile when his heart feels so heavy.

"I just like the idea of second chances." Felicity shrugs, and Oliver takes her hand again. He likes the way her fingers feel between his; they just _fit._

"So do I," he says. He's had his fair share of second chances. If he's lucky, she'll give him one too.


	13. Chapter 13

While Felicity's healing, Oliver gets into the habit of stopping by her house in the afternoon. Usually they go for a walk, and it's good for both of them. Felicity has a tendency to get lost in her work, so an hour in the sunshine gives her eyes a much-needed break from staring at a computer screen, and Oliver gets a reprieve from the seemingly endless meetings with his lawyers, all of whom are strategizing on how to take back control of Queen Consolidated.

On this particular day, they wind up at a playground in Felicity's neighborhood. The place is pretty much empty; it's early enough that the kids are still in school. The air is crisp, the promise of autumn is right around the corner. They've each taken up residence in a swing; Oliver rocks back and forth, digging his feet into the sand as he watches Felicity, who's turning round and round, twisting the chains together.

"I used to do this when I was a kid," she says, looking up as the metal crunches against itself. "The trailer park we lived in had this sad old swing set that was all rusted out. My mom worked late shifts, and when she'd go to work I'd run down to the park and twirl on the swings until it got dark outside."

She's turned the swing to the point where she's almost on her tiptoes, and she's clearly struggling to keep going.

"I don't think you can twist it much more," Oliver says.

Felicity gives him a determined look, and the chains clink one more time, just to spite him. Then she smiles and lifts her feet, laughing as she spins while the chains unravel. She's all breathless when she finally comes to a stop, and the flush on her cheeks makes her look so alive. Oliver wants to lean over and kiss her; he's got this ridiculous notion that she tastes like candy, probably because she's always wearing some kind of pink lipstick. He knows he's wrong, but he wants to find out.

"What would you do after?" he asks, picking at a hangnail on his thumb.

"After what?"

"After it got dark outside."

"Oh," she says as a sad smile pulls at her lips. "I'd go home and make myself some dinner, then I'd visit Miss Price. She lived two doors down from us and her back room was full of broken old computers. She'd let me sit in there and put different pieces together to see if I could get them to work."

Once again, Oliver's reminded of how much of his childhood he took for granted. He always had a warm meal waiting for him, never had to worry about fending for himself. He should find Miss Price, figure out a way to thank her for engaging Felicity's mind, for giving her a passion that led her to him.

Over the past several months, Felicity's slowly been dropping these crumbs of her past, and Oliver eats them up, practically begs for more. Because for all that Felicity talks, she's so good at keeping the important things to herself. There's so much he wants to learn about her, and he's impatient for that knowledge. He wishes he could open her up like a book and read all her pages. He wants to know every single one of her stories by heart.

"I bet Queen manor had a pretty awesome swing set, huh?"

"No, I always wanted a…what are those things called? Jungle gyms? Anyway, I always wanted one, but my mom was worried about the landscaping. She had kids, but she didn't want the house to look like she had kids," he replies with a sad laugh. "There was a nice one at school, but the swings were never my thing."

"What was?"

Oliver nods over at the monkey bars on the other side of the playground. "Tommy and I used to race each other to the top, then we'd sit up there and pretend that we were kings."

Felicity lets out a little laugh. "Weren't you though?"

"We liked to think so," he tells her. He gets the urge to sit up there again, to bring a little of his past into the present. So he stands and says, "C'mon."

Oliver pulls himself up onto the monkey bars easily, then locks his legs around the rungs and reaches down for Felicity. Her warm hands wrap around his forearm, and he tries not to think about how nice her skin feels as he lifts her up.

"Your upper-body strength is insane." Felicity zips up her jacket as she gets herself situated next to Oliver on the bars. "That salmon ladder is good for more than one thing."

Oliver laughs, notices Felicity's purple fingernails as she rubs her hands on her jeans.

"Is that your favorite color?" he asks, pointing at her nails.

She looks down, fans out her fingers. "Yeah. Always has been. My mom used to tell me I'd grow out of it, but not so much."

"Your bedroom is purple," he says. He should probably be embarrassed that he remembers that detail, considering he's only been in there once, but he's not.

"It's lavender."

Oliver grins. "Is there a difference?"

"To a man? Probably not. What's yours?"

"My favorite color? Blue." It's strange, Oliver thinks, that they know intimate details of each others' lives, but they're just now getting around to asking about the simple things. It's always backwards between the two of them: she saves his life, then they become friends. He falls in love with her, then he asks about her favorite color.

Felicity kicks her feet out in front of her, looks at her shoes for a few seconds. "That's funny, I thought it would be green."

"No," he says softly. "It's blue. Raisa used to make me these sugar cookies with blue frosting every year for my birthday."

"I bet you miss her."

Oliver takes a deep breath, nods. Raisa took a job with another family when Oliver could no longer pay her salary. He tries not to think about how he's lost every single person he loved as a child because of mistakes that he's made. He wants to tell Felicity that he's going to be so, _so_ careful with her.

"I do miss her," he replies. "She called me the other day to see how I was doing. She offered to come over and cook for me."

Felicity pushes a few strands of hair off her face, then looks over him. "Does she know you sleep in a dungeon?"

Oliver grins as he shakes his head. "No. And I wouldn't call it a dungeon, not since you fixed it up."

"It's subterranean, Oliver. There's no natural light source, and it's claustrophobic. It's an okay place to run secret vigilante operations from, but a horrible place to live."

Felicity's made no secret of the fact that she hates their new lair. The ceilings aren't as high, and it is cramped. He's been looking for something else now that he's regained control of most of his accounts, but it's difficult to buy real estate on the sly. He's working on it though, he wants to make her happy.

"What does she cook for you?" Felicity asks.

"Lots of stuff. But my favorite? Macaroni and cheese."

"That just so happens to be my specialty," she says proudly.

"The powdered stuff, or-"

Felicity lightly smacks him on the arm. "The good stuff. Criminally good. I'll make some for you sometime. Not that it would be as good as Raisa's, I mean, I wouldn't want to-"

"Felicity," he says, not even trying to hide his amusement. "I would like that."

"Okay," she says, smiling.

There's a break in the conversation, and Oliver doesn't try to fill it. The wind rustles through the leaves in the trees, creates this relaxing white noise. It's not often that Oliver feels so at ease, although it's happening around Felicity more and more often.

Oliver hears a giggle off in the distance, and instinctively turns his head toward it. There's a couple walking along the trail that circles the park, completely wrapped up in one another. They lean in for a kiss, and Oliver turns away, looks right at Felicity.

"They seem happy," she says, and there's this dreamy, far-off look in her eyes that sends warmth flooding through Oliver's chest.

_We could be happy like that_, he thinks. _That could be us._

"They do," he replies.

"I miss holding hands and feeling like things were easy. Do you ever miss things being easy?"

"Every day. Being with Sara was easy, but probably not in the good way," he says, and he's completely shocked by the words that have just come out of his mouth. Not that he hadn't thought that exact thing several times over, but he never thought he'd talk about it with Felicity. Then again, he's doing a lot of things he never thought he would with Felicity.

"What do you mean?"

"She'd seen the worst parts of me; she knew the person I was before, during, and after the island. Her expectations were pretty low. We both knew it wasn't a long term-thing, so there was only so much damage we could do to each other. Things were comfortable and easy, but there wasn't anywhere to go, I guess. I care about her a lot, but we always knew it wouldn't last."

"Because of Laurel," Felicity says quietly.

Oliver wonders if Felicity thinks the idea of Laurel just…follows him around like a shadow. It's not like that anymore; it hasn't been like that for a very long time, and he wants her to know.

"Not because of Laurel," he says, shaking his head. "Because of me and Sara. Laurel's not…she's-"

"You don't have to explain, Oliver."

"I do, though. I _want_ to." He turns his head, waits for Felicity to look at him. She needs to understand this. "She gave me this picture of herself before I got onto the Gambit, and when I washed up on Lian Yu, it was the only thing I had besides the clothes on my back. I watched my dad kill himself, I…I was so alone. I'd look at her picture, and eventually it stopped being about _her,_ you know? I saw her and I just…I thought of home. I romanticized everything about our relationship and the way things were. I hurt her badly, Felicity. Some part of me thought that if I could just get back to her and make things right…"

"You'd get absolution," she says.

"Yeah," he whispers. "I put a lot on her shoulders, and it really wasn't fair. She couldn't have ever lived up to it. When I returned to Starling City, I guess I just…wanted things to go back to the way they were. But that was bad for both of us; we bring out the worst in each other."

"So, there's no hope?"

Oliver's not sure why that makes him smile, but it does. "Not for us. That's not what I want anymore. I haven't wanted that for a long time." He thinks Felicity understands what he's trying to tell her, and he hopes that today it's enough.

A gust of wind kicks up and Felicity shivers, wrapping her arms across her chest. Oliver slips off his coat and asks her to wear it, helps her slide her arms through the sleeves. He tries not to notice how she snuggles into the collar and breathes in.

Oliver hops down off the monkey bars and catches Felicity when she jumps. When he sets her down, she clutches at her side a bit, rubbing the dressing over the wound there.

"Are you hurting?" he asks, putting his hand over hers. He does this more and more lately, wonders if it's getting easier to touch her or becoming more difficult _not_ to. He supposes that it doesn't really matter.

"It just twinges sometimes. The doctor said it would do that for a while."

Oliver's familiar with that particular kind of pain, so he reassures her. "It'll go away. I have some cream that'll help it."

They walk back towards Felicity's house, and it feels wrong not to be connected to her after everything he just told her. So he tries not to over-think it, just reaches out and threads his fingers through hers. They both keep walking like it's no big deal, like he hasn't just changed everything.

Oliver's smiling at the sidewalk, wondering how doing something so ordinary could feel so intimate. He's held her hand before, but this time it's different. This time he's not doing it to comfort her, he's not doing it because she's sick or because she's sad. He's holding her hand because he's walking through a park on a beautiful afternoon next to the woman he loves, and he just wants to touch her.

"Are you gonna stay for dinner?" Felicity asks.

"Yeah," he tells her. He'll stay.

They're just holding hands.

It's a small step, but it's a beginning.


	14. Chapter 14

After a long-fought legal battle, Oliver regains control of Queen Consolidated on a Friday afternoon. When he steps out of the law offices of Baker, Sherman, Deloitte and McKinnon, Felicity is the first person he calls.

"We did it," he tells her, and he can hear her sigh of relief and the smile in her voice when she congratulates him.

They agree to dinner: takeout from their favorite Thai place. She tells him she'll invite Digg and Lyla, Roy, Laurel and Sara to celebrate.

The second person Oliver calls is Thea, and this call goes straight to voicemail, just like all the others. He expects it at this point, but he won't give up. He leaves a short message, tells her the news. Tells her he loves her. When he hangs up, he remembers what Felicity told him: one day the forgiveness will come.

He'll keep trying.

He hopes she's right.

* * *

Later that night, the family Oliver's pieced together through new friendships and old ones is crowded around Felicity's dining room table, which is covered with a mess of takeout containers and dirty plates. They're one chair short, so Oliver's shoved in next to Felicity, sitting on two stacked milk crates that she pulled out of her basement.

They drink sparkling cider and toast to new beginnings, to teamwork, to friendship.

Sara spends most of the evening catching everyone up on her travels. She's seen a lot of the world, and no one mentions exactly what she's doing that affords her that opportunity. Still, it's good to see her and Oliver says so, asks her to come home more often. She tells him she'll try.

Later, after Digg and Lyla have gone home to J.J., and Sara and Laurel have left for some bonding time, Oliver and Felicity pack up the leftovers, and Roy brings stacks of plates into the kitchen.

"Want me to stay and help with the dishes?" Roy asks.

Oliver glances over at Felicity, who's filling the sink with water. "Nah," he says. "We've got it."

"Hey," Roy says to Oliver, looking nervous. "Can I talk to you for a sec?"

"Sure, I'll walk you out."

Roy gives Felicity a hug and thanks her before he follows Oliver to the front door.

"Listen," Roy says, awkwardly shoving his hands in the pockets of his hoodie. "What are you doing tomorrow night?"

Hope surges in Oliver's chest. "Nothing, why?"

"How about you meet me and Thea for dinner?"

Oliver's breath catches; the unrelenting weight of the guilt he carries because of his broken relationship his sister lessens ever so slightly. "Sure," he replies, nodding. "Wherever she wants."

Roy grins, claps Oliver on the shoulder. "She'll call you tomorrow."

* * *

Oliver and Felicity stand side-by-side in front of her sink, doing dishes. She washes, he dries.

She's elbow-deep in sudsy water when she asks, "So, are you back to being CEO now?"

Oliver laughs, shakes his head. "No. I wasn't any good at it."

"What are you going to do then?" She's being very careful not to look at him, and that makes him feel a little uneasy. He's used to feeling nervous and unsure around her lately, but not like this.

"Well," he replies, sliding a pristine white plate on top of the stack in her cupboard. "I asked the current CEO if I could shadow some of the junior executives. I want to learn more about the company, do some work in each of the divisions, see what I'm good at and follow that path. If I'm going to be CEO again, then I want to earn it."

Oliver sees Felicity turn towards him in his peripheral vision. When he finally looks at her, she's smiling. Sure, she's smiled at him thousands of times, but never like this. It's a look that makes his spine straighten, makes him want to stand taller. It makes him feel like something special.

"I'm so proud of you," she says, her voice a little choked. "Not that I'm not usually, it's just you're…"

He thinks she might cry and he knows he can't take that, and truthfully, he's not really sure how to deal with her praise. Before she can find the words she's looking for, he quickly changes the subject. Noticing the growing mountain of suds in the sink, he asks, "What kind of soap is that?"

Felicity looks down and skims her hands over the bubbles. "It's this all-natural stuff I bought, it's supposed to be earth-friendly. I'm not sure what that means exactly, because it's soap, you know? Is it normally not earth-friendly? So I started doing some research on the internet about what's in normal, non-natural soap, because how bad can it be? It's not like…"

She goes off on a tangent, and he just stands there smiling at her like an idiot, so in love with her that he's surprised he manages to function properly when he's around her. It's been a few days since he held her hand in the park, and every second he's near her he longs to do it again.

Oliver's a master of self-deprivation, but he can't deny himself this any longer. He wants her, he just _wants_ her so badly, and he's accepted that it's okay. It's okay to reach out for her, to take what she's willing to give him.

"Felicity," he whispers, and his voice is rough. He slides the backs of his fingers across her cheek to get her attention, and she stills, turns to face him. Her eyes are wide, and she's got this dollop of soap on her chin that makes him smile.

Oliver steps forward until they're a breath apart, then raises his hands and cradles her face. He slides his thumb across her chin, wipes off the soap, and allows himself a moment to take her in. He memorizes the length of her eyelashes, the way the ends curl over the bottom of her brows when she looks up at him. He studies the deep, clear blue of her eyes, and sees all the love staring back at him. Her cheeks are flushed with color, her lips so full and pink.

Romantically speaking, Oliver's always acted on impulse, but this? This is the least impulsive thing he's ever done. He's waited for her, and now he's ready. So he commits every second of this to memory, because he knows it'll be his last first kiss.

Felicity's eyelids flutter shut as he leans in, and he presses his lips against hers. It's very soft and slow and gentle, and it sends a thrill through him, but he knows she's holding back. He expected that, so he's not exactly surprised when she pulls away.

"Oliver," she says, a little breathless. Her eyes are still closed, but her brows are all scrunched up.

Oliver thinks maybe this might be the time to tell her he loves her, but that's the whole reason she doubts this in the first place. He's never been good with words, so he does the only thing he can think of to show her how he really feels.

Gently wrapping his fingers around her wrist, he presses her palm against the center of his chest, where his heart is hammering against his sternum. Because of her, for her; there's really not much of a difference anymore.

Felicity looks surprised when her eyes finally open.

"What-"

"Do you feel it?" Oliver places his hand over hers, slides the pad of his thumb over her knuckles.

Felicity swallows, bites her lip.

Still cupping her cheek, Oliver leans down until his forehead is touching hers. Her breath ghosts over his skin, and the air between them is _electric. _

"Do you understand?" he whispers.

Felicity twists his shirt into her fist and pulls his lips to hers. For all the tenderness of their first kiss, this one is desperate; this one is heat and longing and two years of pent-up desire that finally has an outlet.

Oliver's fingers thread through Felicity's hair as he nips at her bottom lip, teasing the sting away with the tip of his tongue. Their breaths are short and quick, hands everywhere, and they just can't seem to get close enough.

He wants to _breathe_ her, melt into her.

Felicity takes a step back and Oliver follows, the toe of his boot kicking one of her cabinets. He grips her hips, lifts her up onto the counter, and his muscles coil with tension when she wraps her legs around his waist and pulls him against her. She lets out this small whimper when Oliver trails kisses across her jaw and down, _down_. She fumbles with his shirt and he knows he should help her, but he's too heavily invested in the taste of her skin to do anything about it. _Later_, he thinks. He'll worry about himself later.

Oliver curls his fingers around the placket of Felicity's blouse—right near the collar—and pulls. The buttons scatter and plink against the counter, but he doesn't care; he just wants to put his mouth on her, likes the way his stubble turns her delicate skin pink. He licks and sucks, needing to leave his mark on her. She likes it, he can tell by the soft noises she makes as he learns the curves of her body.

"Stay," she whispers, her lips brushing against the shell of his ear.

He nods, trails wet kisses across her collarbone as his hands glide across her heated skin.

He couldn't leave her if he tried.


	15. Chapter 15

Throughout the night, Oliver drifts in and out of sleep, unaccustomed to being so comfortable after spending months sleeping alone on a cot in the lair. But he finds out that even a fitful sleep is a good sleep when he's holding Felicity in his arms. Sometimes she wakes with him, and sometimes he kisses her awake, like he just can't rest until he learns all the secrets of her body.

In the morning, his eyes open when the sunshine peeks through her bedroom window.

This time, he lets her sleep.

They lie together like spoons; Oliver is wrapped protectively around Felicity, her hair is a jumble of curls that's draped across his neck. He grins thinking about everything they did that made her hair so messy, remembers the way it was all fanned out on her pillow as he held himself over her and slid inside of her for the first time. The way the ends tickled his face as she was riding him, her hands pressed into the mattress as she leaned down for a kiss.

He pulls her closer, and smiles when he notices a crescent-shaped bite mark on her shoulder. He gently swipes his thumb over it, fondly recalls the exact moment he did that.

When Oliver can't wait a second longer to talk to her, he presses his lips against that cute little slope along the back of her neck. She snuggles into him, lets out this quiet, satisfied sigh.

"You're really not much of a sleeper, are you?" Felicity asks, her voice a little rough and a lot sexy.

Oliver laughs, kisses his way up her neck until his lips sweep against her ear. "Not with you."

She turns until she's facing him, and he wonders how he's able to make her blush after everything they've done together over the past 12 hours.

Oliver gives Felicity a soft kiss, pushes some of the hair out of her face. "Hi," he says.

She closes her eyes and smiles. "Hi."

"I'm in love with you." He doesn't give her a flowery speech, doesn't try to explain it. He doesn't tell her that he meant what he said that night in the mansion, because they both know that he did. He just tells her because he doesn't think he can keep breathing if he doesn't. "You have…" The sentiment gets caught, and this, _this_ is where he struggles. He swallows, takes a breath, and the words break free. "You'll never know how much."

Felicity cups his cheek, and it's so nice, he thinks, being on the receiving end of it.

"What took you so long?" she teases, doing that thing that she does, shining light into all of his darkness.

"I had to make sure you were safe."

"It's my choice, remember? If this is about the Arrow, then-"

Gently, he slides his thumb across her bottom lip to stop her from voicing that thought, because he needs to say this. "This is about me, Felicity. I had to make sure you were safe with _me."_

"Oliver." Her voice sounds broken and for a second he thinks tears might follow. Then her lips are on his, and it's gentle; so light and so heavy at the same time. "I trust you," she whispers, like she's breathing it into him, hoping those words will become part of who he is.

He closes his eyes, nods, and lets himself feel it. She trusts him, and he won't ever do anything to break that trust.

"Besides," Felicity says airily, "I've been training, so I have moves now, and if you try anything…"

Oliver twists a stray curl around the tip of his finger, amused. "You have moves?"

She playfully swats at him, acts offended. "I seem to recall you liking some of them a lot last night."

He likes her moves, all right. "I think I need you to refresh my memory."

She grins, and it's so beautiful. He wants her smile to be the last thing he sees.

Lacing her fingers through his, she quickly slings her leg around his hip, has him on his back in a second, breathless. They laugh, and it feels good just…laughing. Then she grinds against him, and that feels even better.

Oliver pushes himself up on his elbows, licks a stripe beneath Felicity's breast. She shudders when his stubble grazes her soft, _soft_ skin, and he files that information away in the ever-expanding mental portfolio of Things Felicity Likes. He starts to flip her back over because he wants to be in control this time, but he pauses when he gets a look at their entwined fingers and notices Felicity's nails.

"What?" she asks.

He's got this adoring smile on his face and he's filled with a mix of affection and desire and just…love for this woman. It nearly overwhelms him. "Your fingernails are blue," he replies. His favorite color.

"Yeah," she says tenderly. "I thought you'd like it."

His eyes meet hers, and yeah, he likes it.

"Hey Oliver," she whispers, giving his hand a squeeze.

"Yeah?"

"I love you." She shakes her head, says, "And I'm _in_ love with you." She's smiling and the sun's shining, and-

"Say it again," he replies, feeling a goofy smile tugging at his lips.

"I'm in love with you."

"Again," he whispers.

She leans forward, leveraging her weight against him, gives him a sweet, soft kiss. "I'm in love with you."

The words are pure as water; they wash away his sins.


	16. Chapter 16

On Tuesday afternoons in the spring, Oliver and Felicity meet for lunch in Starling Park. She packs a picnic basket full of his favorite food, and he stakes out a spot under the old overgrown oak tree that she loves so much. She told him once that she thought the long, spindly branches looked like fingers reaching up into the sky, desperate to touch the sun.

There was a time when Oliver was familiar with that feeling.

Today, he's propped up against the trunk of that tree, and Felicity's sitting between his legs, resting the back of her head on his shoulder. The fingers of their right hands are laced together; Felicity's left hand holds a container of chicken salad, and Oliver's holds a fork. He stabs a piece of celery with the tines and offers it to her. He saves the grapes for himself because he knows she doesn't like them; she puts them in there because she knows that he does.

"What do you think about Italy?" he asks.

"As far as boot-shaped countries go, or-"

"As far as vacation destinations go," he explains. "Just you and me."

He can tell he's taken her by surprise; she's mentioned wanting to photograph the Spanish Steps in Rome, but she probably thought he wasn't paying attention. It surprises her still, the things he remembers. When it comes to her, he remembers _everything_.

"What about our…nighttime activities?"

Oliver grins and leans forward, gently catches her earlobe between his teeth the way she likes. "I hoped we could continue with those," he whispers.

She laughs, squeezes his hand. "You know what I mean."

He does, always.

"Roy and Thea can handle things for a couple of weeks." It still feels strange sometimes, including his sister as a part of their team. He doesn't want this for her, but it's not his decision to make. Besides, working with him seems to make her happy and she deserves that, at least.

"Did you have anything in particular in mind?" Felicity asks.

There's a photographer from National Geographic in Venice who's going to show her around the city and give her some tips. There's a villa in the Tuscan countryside overlooking a vineyard that's waiting for them to arrive. And there's a two-karat art deco engagement ring hidden in Oliver's suitcase that he hopes will find a home on her finger. Because Felicity? She's forever.

"No," he replies, kissing her neck, breathing in the soapy clean smell of her hair. "Nothing in particular. I just want to spend some time with you."

"Okay."

"Okay?" He asks, surprised. He was kind of thinking this whole trip thing was going to be a much tougher sell.

"Yes, okay. I want to spend some time with you, too." She turns and offers him that smile of hers that makes him forget his own name. The one that makes hope well up and slowly fill the cracks between the broken pieces inside of him.

"When are we going?"

Oliver shrugs, casually says, "Friday."

She sets down the container she was holding and laughs. "Friday?"

"If it's an issue with your boss, I can talk her into letting you have some time off." He leans in close, whispers, "She thinks I'm sexy."

Felicity holds out her hand, her thumb and index finger a centimeter or two apart. "Just a little."

Oliver laughs and pulls her in for a kiss. It starts out slow and builds on itself, until they're melting into one another and he can't tell where he ends and she begins. Kissing her is as easy as breathing, and he knows he's going to be kissing her for the rest of his days. He's not even worried about how few or how many he has left.

In the end he'll have no regrets, because his life was pretty perfect for a while.


End file.
